And from the other side of the isle....most mainstream media has indeed portrayed it as something of a joke but, though America's Cup 33 may well have appeared to be two billionaires playing with their toys, there was a lot more to it than that. Ernesto Barterelli and his Swiss team Alinghi were the first European team to both win and successfully defend the Cup since it's inception in 1851. Quite an accomplishment. In what I think was a misguided attempt to gain total control over the Cup competition at the end of 32; Bertarelli formed a paper tiger of a yacht club in order to challenge himself. Several teams protested but none had the moxie to mount a material protest. Larry Ellison took it to court as the challange was not only unfair, it was in violation of the Deed of Gift that established the rules for Cup competition in the late 1800's. The resulting legal maneuvering gave the whole thing a black eye but, as is often the case where agreements cannot be reached, seemed the only recourse. If fault can be assigned by a score; Larry Ellison was 11 for 11 in his legal challenges. The Deed of Gift is a charitable trust and very difficult to break so, in the end, it became the rules for the race. The Deed specifies agreement as the controlling factor in a Cup challenge. Ernesto and Larry couldn't agree on much of anything. Since the Deed was written in the late 1800's, it is not very limiting. A single masted boat must be between 40 and 90 feet and that's about it. This is the reason the boats were so ridiculous or magnificent depending on your point of view. Anyway, the Cup is back in the US after a 15 year absence, Ernesto is claiming sour grapes and Larry is promising an interesting multi challenger, multi defender, possibly multi hull competetion for AC 34. If you followed the whole story from the beginning and know the history of the Cup; it was all quite interesting. If you are a multihull sailor; the racing itself was nothing short of amazing...

This has totally ended up a great big joke--it is not a true sporting event but rich boys with their toys playing absolutely ridiculous games--how this has all been allowed to happen I just don't know --but Americas cup racing ?????????????? I think not, and apart from watching these beasts of machines to see if one hopefully splits apart the whole event lacks interest---WHO BLOODY CARES WHO WINS apart from the rich boys themselves, what a sham and what a shame.