By HELEN TUNNAH
America's Cup challengers Alinghi and Oracle BMW Racing say they have no plans to protest against Team New Zealand's radical new yacht design which has critics baffled.
Both challenging skippers, New Zealanders Russell Coutts and Chris Dickson, yesterday praised the defender's new hull appendage, nicknamed the hula, and said
protests against it were not being considered.
Alinghi and Oracle race each other in the challenger series final starting today. The team which first wins five races sails against Team New Zealand for the America's Cup next month.
Oracle has had its legal team scouring the rule books over the hula, and Alinghi asked the international jury a set of questions about how a protest against it could be considered valid.
One of the teams, thought to be Alinghi, has also asked the official measuring committee a separate set of questions about what a syndicate needed to do to demonstrate a hula-style appendage was legal.
Alinghi is known to have been testing a similar device.
It is not clear whether Alinghi would have time to modify their race boat, SUI64, to include a hula between the Louis Vuitton Cup final and by the time boats are checked by measurers and unveiled before the America's Cup.
Team New Zealand's hula has been attacked by critics, mainly from overseas, who suggest it flouts the intent of America's Cup class rules.
The appendage fits snugly, sometimes just millimetres, beneath the stern of Team New Zealand's boat, and under the rules must not touch the hull except at the point where it is attached.
Yesterday Coutts and Dickson, both former skippers of New Zealand America's Cup teams, praised the design.
Alinghi skipper Coutts said, "It looks like they have done some good work and full marks to them." Asked if Alinghi would protest against the boats, he said: "You won't see any from us".
Dickson, skipper of Oracle, said it looked like Team New Zealand had done "a very nice job".
Team New Zealand has already satisfied the measurers the hula complies with the rules, but how they did so remains, as with all design data, confidential.
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