The first races in the battle for the America's Cup have started - almost - as expected. Top favourite and defending champion Oracle Team USA has won both of its races: Skipper Jimmy Spithill and his crew confidently defeated the French Groupama Team France. And after several lead changes, they also beat Emirates Team New Zealand. It was noticeable that Oracle changed two grinders from race one to race two. However, helmsman Spithill was not enthusiastic after the races: "We are happy about the two victories, but we are not satisfied. We had some bad tacks and that allowed the Kiwis to get past us again. The guys are not happy tonight. We can improve a lot before tomorrow's races."
The French outsiders, on the other hand, lost their two opening duels against the Americans and the New Zealanders. However, it was the British team Land Rover BAR that surprised the most: first with their victory against the Swedish team Artemis Racing, who had been so dominant in training recently, and then with their second self-inflicted collision within ten days - in this case with SoftBank Team Japan. While the sailors of both teams remained largely unharmed, although the frightening slow-motion footage gave an idea of how narrowly they escaped worse consequences, both boats, especially the British "Rita", suffered severe damage and a hole in the hull. Japan's skipper Dean Barker was confident in the evening that his team would be ready to start again on Sunday. Ainslie wasn't quite so sure: "Unfortunately, I'm not a boat builder. Our boat is really quite badly damaged. The most important thing is that nobody was injured. I can only hope that we'll be ready to go again tomorrow. Our fantastic Shore crew will do everything humanly possible for that."
Barker: "Ben has apologised"
The crash occurred in the fiercely contested pre-start phase of the second duel between the British and Japanese drivers involved. "It was unfortunate," said Sir Ben Ainslie, describing the incident, "we got a bit too high on the foil and slid sideways." From the perspective of SoftBank skipper Dean Barker, the situation looked like this: "You know what's coming, but you can't stop it. I saw a nasty big black hull coming at us from the side, which then landed on our hull. We also sustained some damage (ed.: including a broken steering wheel), but hopefully we'll be able to solve the problems by tomorrow. Ben has apologised. It was clearly their mistake. But that doesn't change the fact that both Shore crews will have a huge mountain of work to do overnight." The point went to the Japanese after the penalty for the Brits, who finished 48 seconds ahead of Land Rover BAR. Both teams were able to finish the race, but the Brits struggled to make it into the harbour afterwards. Ainslie said: "Our boat was about to sink. We pumped water out with all our might. The last time I did something like that was 30 years ago in an Opti."
However, Ainslie did not forget to savour the impressive victory over the Swedes after the collision: "We had a fantastic race against Artemis. Many experienced Cup observers had already written us off. But we scored today when it really counted. I think we silenced a lot of our critics. We were a good team that I'm very proud of." Team Land Rover BAR had also changed two grinders for the second race of the day. The Swedes, who completed their two duels with an identical crew, also finished the first day on an even keel, however, as they defeated SoftBank Team Japan in their second encounter.
After the first six duels, the British and the Americans lead the standings. The British, because they started the qualifiers with two bonus points from the World Series and now have a total of three points. The Americans, because they started the qualifiers with one bonus point and also have three points thanks to their two victories on Saturday.
Here to see the interim results after day 1.
What the skippers had to say about their teams' performances on the first day
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
