7.00pm
It was a day of devastation for Sweden's Victory Challenge as they lost the third race in their quarter-final repechage match-up with Italy's Prada today.
The crew of Victory Challenge's Orm SWE-73 sailed a superb early race to lead Prada's Luna Rossa ITA-74 well into the second leg as they eyed
their first repechage win.
But the margin had been only one or two boat lengths on the downwind stretch, and Prada were able to pull slightly in front.
When Victory started to come back at them, Prada turned towards the Swedes who were in the windward position and had to avoid contact.
As Victory changed direction to keep away from Prada they broached, their spinnaker pole broke and their spinnaker came down.
To add insult to injury, the Swedes were penalised as their falling sail touched Luna Rossa.
Despite the huge setback, the Victory crew continued to sail well and, even without a spinnaker pole in the last two downwind legs and after carrying out a penalty turn, they were just 51sec behind at the finish.
The end result was that Prada went to a 3-0 lead in their match-up, and the Swedes are in the same position as Stars and Stripes, just one loss away from being knocked out of the competition.
- NZPA
nzherald.co.nz/americascup
Racing schedule, results and standings
