The America's Cup is an uncomfortable trophy. No sooner has it been won than the next challenger comes along and wants to take it away again. This time too, the Golden Gate Yacht Club, for which billionaire Larry Ellison won the Cup, received the papers from Australia shortly after the end of the 19th and decisive race.
The Hamilton Island Yacht Club (HIYC), located in the north-east of Australia behind the Great Barrier Reef, is challenging for the jug. Club boss Robert Oatley and his son Sandy threw down the gauntlet for the club. 83-year-old Robert Oatley, known as Bob, is a winemaker and wine merchant and, according to Forbes magazine, is the 25th richest person in Australia. His net worth is estimated at 850 million US dollars.
Oatley is also a keen sailor and is famous for his yachts called "Wild Oats", with which he has won six of the last eight Sydney Hobart Races.
Australia has already won the Cup once, in 1983 with the legendary wing-keeled twelve-man, ending the 132-year winning streak of US teams. Since then, the Cup has regularly changed winning nations. The last time an Australian team competed was in 2000, and the most spectacular end to the campaign was in 1995, when the "Australia One" broke up and sank within a minute (see video).
The first challenger, the so-called Challenger of Record, has the right to determine the conditions for the next defence together with the defender. "First we have to decide on the venue, which has always been the defender's right," said Tom Ehman, Vice Commodore of the Golden Gate Yacht Club.
Cup winner Larry Ellison had recently been very vague when asked about another defence in front of San Francisco. Although the venue proved to be almost ideal, there was a lot of trouble with the city and the organisers during the preparations.
The sinking of the "One Australia" at the 1995 America's Cup
The defender and the challenger also want to sit down with the other potential challengers by spring 2014 and work out a concept for the future, which above all includes lower costs for the teams, according to Ehman.
It will be particularly interesting to see whether the nation rule desired by the New Zealanders will be reintroduced. After all, they had four of their compatriots on the victorious Oracle cat and, with helmsman Jimmy Spithill and strategist Tom Slingsby, even two of the key figures. Not a bad line-up for a promising challenge.
Lars Bolle
Chief Editor Digital
