Shosholoza update

RSA48 back in Cape Town

South Africa's America's Cup yacht Shosholoza RSA 48 is once again in Cape Townafter being away in Europe for the past three months. Yacht Shosholoza arrived back in Cape Town aboard an MSC container ship today and will be offloaded this afternoon.

Members of Team Shosholoza will be assisting with the moving of the yacht to the V&A Waterfront by floating crane where she will be lifted onto the quayside at the team's new permanent base (between the Cape Grace Hotel and the BOE headquarters and flanked by the fishing boat fleet.)

Team Shosholoza will be operating out of their new SA America's Cup Challenge Base in the V&A Waterfront from today. Until now the team worked out of a couple of containers in the Waterfront where meetings and all activities were held in the open air.

The new base has a mini sail loft, office space, a kitchen, showers and an upstairs entertainment area and deck overlooking the V&A. The quayside is spacious with ample space for yacht Shosholoza RSA 48 to be lifted out of the water daily.

The team will spend the first week of November match racing on local 26ft yachts as skipper Geoff Meek and three crew members, Guido Verhovert, Alex Runciman and Marc Lagesse, leave at the weekend for the next leg of the Swedish Match Tour. This event, the Nippon Cup, will be held in Tokyo, Japan.

The rest of team will re-rig Shosholoza RSA 48 and prepare her for sailing from the 16th and get her back up to racing mode by 24 November when the others return from Japan.

Sailing manager Paul Standbridge says he will continue to try out two new crew members per week and is still looking to build the team by six sailors prior to Act 4 in Europe in June 2005. He is specifically looking for four crew weighing 105kg each to help give more muscle power to the sailing crew.