By JULIE ASH
The two Italian syndicates go head to head tomorrow wrapping up the first round of the Louis Vuitton Challenger series.
Tomorrow is officially the first day of the second round robin, but race organisers decided just to sail the outstanding race between Prada and Mascalzone Latino, which was postponed
in the first round, and leave the start of the first full flight of round robin two until Wednesday.
As the only one-boat campaign in the America's Cup, Mascalzone Latino have spent the last seven days making repairs and minor changes to their boat while Prada have almost completely remodelled ITA74 - which now sports a knuckle bow.
Prada skipper Francesco de Angelis said his team did an 'amazing job' in such a short period of time.
"We did work some work in different areas. We did work we thought appropriate after the first round. Obviously the most visible change is the bow and the hull but that is not everything. We did some work on the sails, the rig...
"We are looking forward to this round and assessing the changes."
Mascalzone Latino helmsman Paolo Cian said it is going to be tough coming up against a revamped Prada.
"We just have to sail the boat as fast as we can," he said.
Tomorrow's weather is for 18-22 knots with gusts to 26 knots moderating in the afternoon while Wednesday's forecast is for light 5-10 knot southwesterly winds.
Sweden's Victory Challenge is the only team to have opted to change yachts between rounds, switching from SWE63 to SWE73 for the second round.
In Wednesday's races OneWorld face Mascalzone Latino, Oracle BMW Racing face Prada, Team Dennis Conner face GBR Challenge and Le Defi Areva face Alinghi. Victory Challenge have the bye.
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