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The two courses offering the best public visibility for next year’s America’s Cup have been eliminated after a move by challengers, which the New Zealand team calls a deliberate attempt to undermine the event.
The race’s Refereeing Panel’s decision removes the courses closest to the North Head and North Shore beaches near the mouth of Auckland’s Waitematā Harbor, where the defender expected tens of thousands of spectators to gather.
The panel accepted an “all or nothing” argument from the Challenger of Record, in effect Italy’s Luna Rossa, that because course restrictions may apply on some days, they should never be used.
New Zealand team executive director Grant Dalton called the move “outrageous,” and the team is considering bringing it back before the panel.
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“No one should be wrong about what we have said for some time: that the motivation of these guys [challengers], particularly Luna Rossa, is doing anything to take the cup away from New Zealand, and if that means damaging the event in the process, so be it, “said Dalton. Stuff.
Dalton said the premise – that the New Zealand team would gain an advantage – is flawed, because while the challengers are in another field, the two inner fields would not be usable due to spectator traffic.
“The paranoia is evident in the app, particularly from Luna Rossa, that while they’re racing, we could be sailing in an area where you can go any other time, five days a week,” he said.
The three-member Arbitration Panel split 2 to 1 on the decision.
Emirates Team New Zealand / Supplied
A map showing the fields marked to compete in the America’s Cup regattas, after a ruling by the Refereeing Panel.
“The business consequences so close to the events will not be insignificant,” said the dissenting opinion of panel member Graham McKenzie.
“The dispute relates to availability for 12 possible race days during the challenger selection series, round robins and semifinals,” he said.
The regatta director, Australian Iain Murray, had supported the retention of internal courses B and C, but proposed that Team NZ not be allowed on a designated day, if the port captain imposed limitations.
Murray wanted to maintain the discretion to select between the five courses, on each race day.
Todd Niall / Stuff
New Zealand team boss Grant Dalton has called the camps strike “outrageous”.
“The decision will be significant for the 30,000 spectators that would line the boardwalk, Bastion Point and North Head,” Dalton said.
Dalton said the effect would actually be to limit racing to the outer Hauraki Gulf field used in the 2003 defense, and the fields east near Buckland Beach.
The New Zealand team had taken full advantage, during three years of planning, of the appeal of track-visible racetracks, a feature that will be lost except during the Christmas regatta in December.
The television images of the races that also show Auckland are one of the selling points of the support of the city to organize the event.
Stuff has contacted Auckland Council’s Department of Economic and Tourism Development, Ateed, for comment.
