A beautiful win

Ed Gorman assesses GBR Challenge's form after today's much needed victory and brings us up to date with the latest from the Viaduct Basin

With a scoreline of four defeats and one win, the GBR Challenge team were starting to feel the pressure in the Louis Vuitton Cup amid mutterings from all sorts of experts that they did not look the part, their tactics were naive and they couldn't match race.

To make matters apparently worse, some interpreted the unexpected benching of starting helmsman Andy Green for his rival Andy Beadsworth, as a sign of panic in the management. Green had been occupying the starting job for months and could never have imagined that he would be dispensed with after just four races.

Bringing Beadsworth on was a big call. It was a big blow to Green's confidence on the one hand, which is going to make it very hard to bring him back, but also a move which put Beadsworth himself under tremendous pressure to get it right while working with an afterguard he has not started with regularly for a long time.

After a "good loss" to Prada on Thursday in the first test of the new combination, the switch was fully vindicated today when the British crew raced to a superb win over the impressive Victory Challenge, skippered by Beadsworth's old rival on the Olympic match-racing circuit, Jesper Bank.

If Beadsworth is feeling the pressure he certainly isn't showing it. Against Prada he did well; against the Swedes he was in his best form, second-guessing Bank's attempts to turn the tables on him and then nailing him good and proper in the last minute. Some say Beadsworth has had plenty of opportunities in his career and not taken them and is on a downhill slope after his 12th place nightmare at the Sydney Olympics. On current form that looks to be nonsense.

The pre-start saw Beadsworth, with starboard entry, maintain control over Bank through a series of dial-ups and initially look to win the right. However, mid-way through the sequence a lefthand shift brought a fairly quick change of strategy among the brains at the back of the British boat - with Beadsworth pushing them to make their mind up - and the game switched to the pin.

Gybing at the committee with a minute to go, Bank turned inside Wight Lightning and both yachts started weaving left with Bank clear ahead but early. Beadsworth chased him all the way and, under pressure from the dark blue and grey Wight Lightning, the Danish skipper made the smallest of misjudgements, allowing Orn's bow to break the line two seconds too soon.

While the hapless Swedes were left to circle round the pin, the Brits were off with the adrenalin in full flow. Syndicate boss Peter Harrison, in his deckchair in the 17th man slot, was grinning from ear-to-ear as he turned to watch a gap, which he has paid for with his own millions, grow with every second. By the time the Swedes had set themselves up again, they were 25-seconds behind and a win for the Brits, which few were predicting, was on the cards.

But with a light southwesterly breeze blowing off Auckland's North Shore onto the Hauraki Gulf, this was to be a horrible day for tacticians. Ado Stead assisted by Chris Main up the rig and Beadsworth in the strategist's role, did a good job of protecting their lead, balancing covering their opponent with sailing the shifts and trying to use the variable bands of pressure. The wheels only looked to be coming off once when the Swedes suddenly lurched back into the lead in the latter sections of the second beat, benefitting from a big righthander. But as quickly as it had leftthem, the balance of fortune swung back Britain's way and Wight Lightning picked up her own puff and rocked up to the mark, extending to 300 metres within minutes. At the death the Brits were over the line a comfortable 48 seconds to the good.

With Oracle BMW Racing and Mascalzone Latino still to come, Ian Walker's team can now hope with some confidence to finish this opening round with three points, just one short of Walker's own goal when racing started. The way results are going, the battle in the middle of the nine-strong Louis Vuitton fleet still looks to be very tight with the Swedes still up there, alongside an improving Prada and chased by the Brits and Dennis Conner's Stars & Stripes.

The other notable race today was the hotly-awaited contest between Russell Coutts's Alinghi and the unbeaten Oracle team skippered by Peter Holmberg. On a day which made true comparisons hard to make, the two teams looked well-matched for two-thirds of the opening beat before Alinghi stole ahead and then extended on almost every leg, to win by one minute and 43 seconds.

Holmberg is a cool customer and he was his usual unruffled self at the post-race press conference, implying fairly clearly that USA 76 has been optimised for slightly greater winds speeds than seen on the racecourse today.

The big talking point in the Viaduct Harbour remains the all-too painful struggles at Prada where a lot of people seem to be having a not very nice time. Syndicate boss Patrizio Bertelli has been throwing his weight around and one can see why many regard him as his own team's biggest weakness. The news that ITA 80 has been taken round to a boatyard to be modified with a chain saw has surprised no-one in the wake of the sacking of chief designer Doug Peterson. The question is, can Prada jag enough points in the rest of this round and the next one using their sluggish ITA 74 to avoid falling into the bottom half of the draw? Having designed the series to trap what Bertelli saw as the also-rans in the bottom half, it will be ironic indeed if his over-spent and over-wrought team end up in it themselves.

Prada have so far won three races - against the GBR Challenge, Le Defi and the Swedes. They were extremely lucky to beat the Swedes who had them down and out before the breeze started fizzling out. Only a flyer on the last leg saved Prada's blushes on that occasion.But with Mascalzone Latino and OneWorld to come, their maximum score in this round looks to be four points. Bertelli may be furious - but many watching him had predicted exactly this sort of performance from his team before racing even began.