By Dana Johannsen
America’s Cup heavyweights at odds as tension hits boiling point
Russell Coutts, the mastermind behind the format for next year’s America’s Cup, has admitted he made a mistake with the AC72 class rule and revealed he even tried to scale back the size of the boat late last year.
The Oracle chief executive claims his efforts to revise the design of the wingsail catamarans when it became apparent other teams were struggling with the costs and complexity of the project were blocked by Team New Zealand counterpart Grant Dalton.
But, in what is sure to bring simmering tensions between the two teams to boiling point, Dalton has fired back at Coutts, accusing the four-time Cup winner of trying to “spin his way out of trouble”.
Under the original plans for the 34th America’s Cup unveiled in September 2010, competitors were supposed to be racing their AC72s in this week’s world series regatta in San Francisco.
But with just three challengers confirmed for the Cup next year, and only one of them – Team New Zealand – having got their boat wet yet, the remaining regattas on the circuit will be sailed in the AC45s.
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