Practise run

With a year to go until the real thing America's Cup match racing underway tomorrow in Valencia with Act 12

2006 championship points after two Acts:

Pos	Team	Act 10		Act 11
		Pos	Pnts	Pos	Pnts	Tot
1	Luna Rossa Challenge	2	11	2	11	22
2	Alinghi	4	9	1	12	21
3	BMW Oracle Racing	1	12	4	9	21
4	Emirates Team NZ	3	10	3	10	20
5	Mascalzone Latino-Capitalia Team	7	6	5	8	14
6	Team Shosholoza	8	5	6	7	12
7	Deafio Espanol 2007	5	8	9	4	12
8	Victory Challenge	6	7	10	3	10
9	39 Challenge	9	4	8	5	9
10	Areva Challenge	10	3	7	6	9
11	United Internet Team Germany	11	2	11	2	4
12	China Team	12	1	12	1	2

The final act of the 2006 America's Cup competition season, Louis Vuitton Act 12, begins tomorrow off Valencia. Up for grabs is the 2006 America's Cup Class season championship, along with Louis Vuitton Ranking points for the challengers.

In preparation for Act 12, the teams have completed their final preparations and are ready to compete while the Port America's Cup is ready to receive an influx of hundreds of boats and thousands of spectators each day.

Act 12 will be significant for several reasons. In the build-up to previous America's Cup the defender has not had the opportunity to race against the challengers. Under the protocol for the 32nd America's Cup this changed, with the introduction of the Acts and aside from making the challengers considerably more competitive, it also enabled the defender to compete. However with one year to the day to go until the America's Cup kicks off itself, Act 12 will be the last occasion Alinghi will be able to check in against the defenders in a match race environment. They will of course still be able to check out their speed for a final time against the defenders again at the beginning of April next year in the fleet racing of Act 13, then that will be it until the America's Cup series itself.
"It's been good for us because we've got to sail against other teams all the way since the last Cup in Auckland," says Alinghi skipper Brad Butterworth. "It's been good for us and I think it's been good for the challengers as well."

Louis Vuitton Act 12 differs from previous Acts in format - it's almost like a mini Louis Vuitton Cup, with a round robin, semi final and final. The difference is that here the Defender, Alinghi, is competing and no teams are eliminated after the round robin.
Instead, at the conclusion of the round robin the 12 teams are ranked and grouped into three divisions of four boats. Each division races its own semi finals, final and petit final to determine placings within the group. Each semi final and final is a 'first to win two' series.

Occurring at the same time this year as the America's Cup racing will happen next, it will be interesting to see what conditions on the water are like.

In terms of hard-ware, BMW Oracle Racing, Luna Rossa and Emirates Team New Zealand will again be using their new Version 5 boats. However Alinghi have confirmed that they will not be using their new boat SUI91 in this Act. The defenders claim it is not ready to be raced. Others reckon Alinghi are keeping their powder dry, not wanting to reveal their hand too early. They will once again race SUI 75 although this time with Peter Holmberg behind the wheel - one wonders if this is significant given it will be their last match racing in anger for a year.

The first of the 'B' teams to show off its new version 5 boat aside from Team Shosholoza (who were the first to launch their boat last year), will be Desafio Español. Tactician tactician John Cutler said the team is excited to be using its new boat, ESP 88, but the decision wasn't taken lightly. "We thought long and hard about whether to use ESP 88 for this regatta, but we're trying to improve and we felt that getting the boat out there and learning more about how to race it would be the best thing. We'll see in two weeks whether or not that was the right call," he explained.

Meanwhile the +39 base has been awhurr today with their arrival of their brand new Version 5 boat, ITA 85 to their base in Valencia by truck from Tarragona. The boat was built at Fabio Soleri's shipyard in Alfonsine, near Ravenna under the watchful eye of principle designer Giovanni Ceccarelli. The boat itself will be formally unveiled on Saturday night by Ceccarelli and composites expert Sebastiano Rech Morassutti, who started his long career with the building of Il Moro de Venezia. Meanwhile Iain Percy's team have been continue to train with ITA 59, the last regatta for this boat .

Mascalzone Latino will also not be using their new ITA 90. "We’ve basically had ITA 90 in the water sailing doing a lot of structural testing and a little boat speed testing against ITA 77," explains the team's Cameron Dunn. "Everything has been very, very positive so far. We did have a small issue with ITA 90 around the traveller area and it´s taking some time to fix. For that reason we didn’t think it was prudent to pull her straight back out before Act 12 and race straight away with her, as we just haven’t had enough time to feel confident in the boat, yet.

“Right now we’re in a very good frame of mind (comfortable) with 77. We’ve made various improvements to her in reliability and speed, especially. So right now it was a pretty easy decision. We would feel pretty silly going into an act with a boat that we haven’t really fully tested throughout the whole range of conditions. I think everybody’s nightmare is to enter a new boat that you haven’t sailed, for example, in 20+ knots and all of a sudden Act 12 is all windy with big waves. If we break stuff or things don’t work- things that we haven’t encountered before…then it’s not so clever. Look at Team New Zealand in the last America’s Cup: the issues they had with their boat once it came racing hard in the wind, they started breaking things. It doesn’t look so good from the outside, even though you’ve got a lot of good people in the team. So we’re very happy to race ITA 77. We’re feeling very confident with her. We’ve made some improvements, so we’re really looking forward to Act 12 to see if we can do a little better than we did in Act 10”.



Emirates Team New Zealand meanwhile have been trying to up their crew work. ”Since last December when we launched NZL 84 our primary goal has been to attend to boat speed. NZL 84’s performance in Acts 10 and 11 showed the boat is okay," explains Grant Dalton. “Since the end of Act 11, the team’s focus has been on developing crew work - combinations, starts and mark rounding. We have raced informally against some of the other challengers and also in-house. Those races are full on. We prepare for the day’s racing just as we would for a regatta.”

Instead of doing this exclusively in their Cup yachts many of the sailing team have taken to TP 52s. Immediately after Act 11, 12 of the crew flew to Punta Ala, Italy, to
sail on Warpath, ultimately first in the regatta, and on the second yacht Mean Machine. “We showed on the TP 52 regatta at Punta Ala right after the end of Act 11 that we can win regattas,” Dalton continues. “The team has high skills - it could be argued that we peaked a week too late.”

The end of the Volvo Ocean Race has seen many crew releases. Most notably Brasil 1 skipper Torben Grael returns to his afterguard duties within Luna Rossa where he first raced as tactician when the team, as Prada, making it through to win the Louis Vuitton Cup in 2000. Whether Grael will be introduced immediately remains to be seen as at present Charlie McKee is holding the tactician's role on the Italian A boat. Aside from Grael, ABN AMRO Two navigator Simon Fisher is back on board with K Challenge, while Pepe Ribes has signed not with the Spanish but with the Swedes on Victory Challenge.

Racing for the first match of flight one, Emirates Team New Zealand against China Team, is scheduled to begin at 14:10 on Thursday.

Pairing list - Act 12:

Thursday, 22/06/2006
Flight 1
Match 1 Mascalzone Latino -Capitalia Team - Luna Rossa Challenge
Match 2 +39 Challenge - Victory Challenge
Match 3 Emirates Team New Zealand - China Team
Match 4 Alinghi - Areva Challenge
Match 5 Team Shosholoza - Desafío Español 2007
Match 6 United Internet Team Germany - BMW ORACLE Racing

Flight 2
Match 1 +39 Challenge - Emirates Team New Zealand
Match 2 Luna Rossa Challenge - China Team
Match 3 Victory Challenge - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team
Match 4 Areva Challenge - Desafío Español 2007
Match 5 BMW ORACLE Racing - Team Shosholoza
Match 6 Alinghi -United Internet Team Germany

Friday, 23/06/2006
Flight 3
Match 1 BMW ORACLE Racing - Areva Challenge
Match 2 Team Shosholoza - United Internet Team Germany
Match 3 Alinghi - Desafío Español 2007
Match 4 Emirates Team New Zealand - Victory Challenge
Match 5 China Team - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team
Match 6 +39 Challenge - Luna Rossa Challenge

Flight 4
Match 1 Alinghi - Team Shosholoza
Match 2 Areva Challenge - United Internet Team Germany
Match 3 Desafío Español 2007 - BMW ORACLE Racing
Match 4 Victory Challenge - Luna Rossa Challenge
Match 5 China Team - +39 Challenge
Match 6 Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - Emirates Team New Zealand

Saturday, 24/06/2006
Flight 5
Match 1 China Team - Victory Challenge
Match 2 BMW ORACLE Racing - Alinghi
Match 3 Team Shosholoza - Areva Challenge
Match 4 Desafío Español 2007 - United Internet Team Germany
Match 5 Luna Rossa Challenge - Emirates Team New Zealand
Match 6 +39 Challenge - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team

Flight 6
Match 1 China Team - Alinghi
Match 2 Victory Challenge - BMW ORACLE Racing
Match 3 Team Shosholoza - +39 Challenge
Match 4 United Internet Team Germany - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team
Match 5 Desafío Español 2007 - Luna Rossa Challenge
Match 6 Areva Challenge - Emirates Team New Zealand

Sunday, 25/06/2006
Flight 7
Match 1 Areva Challenge - Luna Rossa Challenge
Match 2 United Internet Team Germany - Emirates Team New Zealand
Match 3 Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - Desafío Español 2007
Match 4 BMW ORACLE Racing - +39 Challenge
Match 5 Victory Challenge - Alinghi
Match 6 China Team - Team Shosholoza

Flight 8
Match 1 Desafío Español 2007 - Emirates Team New Zealand
Match 2 Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - Areva Challenge
Match 3 United Internet Team Germany - Luna Rossa Challenge
Match 4 BMW ORACLE Racing - China Team
Match 5 Alinghi - +39 Challenge
Match 6 Team Shosholoza - Victory Challenge

Monday, Reserve Day

Tuesday, 27/06/2006
Flight 9
Match 1 +39 Challenge - Desafío Español 2007
Match 2 United Internet Team Germany - Victory Challenge
Match 3 Areva Challenge - China Team
Match 4 Emirates Team New Zealand - Team Shosholoza
Match 5 Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - Alinghi
Match 6 Luna Rossa Challenge - BMW ORACLE Racing

Flight 10
Match 1 United Internet Team Germany - +39 Challenge
Match 2 Desafío Español 2007 - China Team
Match 3 Victory Challenge - Areva Challenge
Match 4 Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - BMW ORACLE Racing
Match 5 Luna Rossa Challenge - Team Shosholoza
Match 6 Emirates Team New Zealand - Alinghi

Tuesday, 28/06/2006
Flight 11
Match 1 Team Shosholoza - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team
Match 2 Emirates Team New Zealand - BMW ORACLE Racing
Match 3 Luna Rossa Challenge - Alinghi
Match 4 China Team - United Internet Team Germany
Match 5 +39 Challenge - Areva Challenge
Match 6 Victory Challenge - Desafío Español 2007

The America's Cup Act can be viewed daily in the UK on Sky Sports 1 and 2 - but get a video recorder because it's on at obscure times!