Racing canned

A lightning closes in on Alinghi's defender trials in Dubai

Lightening and torrential rain forced the race committee to abandon racing on day 3 of the Defender Series in Dubai.

Ed Baird - today racing SUI91 - started a little ahead to leeward of Holmberg. Both boats sailed out to the right-hand layline, Holmberg (SUI64) managed to get across Baird (SUI91) and round the topmark ahead. Holmberg gybed straight away in a left-hand shift, snatching the lead before racing was abandoned for safety reasons.

Holmberg later commented on the call to gybe: "Juan Vila, our navigator stood out as really strong on a day like today, when it’s stormy and a bit wild. He has sailed around the world a few times and deals with this a lot. He saw the storm system coming and felt that it would continue to shift and it paid off."

Butterworth gives his views on the racing so far: “I think we have got to get a bit better, I don’t think we’re sailing the boats to their optimum yet, we can always get better and that applies to both boats. I think we’re not a long way away from where we want to be at Cup time, but we have got quite a bit of work to do."

Meanwhile Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, uncle of UAE Vice President and Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum came to visit Ernesto Bertarelli, the team syndicate head and the Alinghi compound today.

Australian match racing veteran Peter Gilmour, consultant to Alinghi, arrived last night and has been observing today, getting to know the team and trying to work outwhere he is going to slot in. Butterworth comments: "It’s good to have him with us and we’ll see how it all goes."