View photosKEY POINTS:
VALENCIA - The name Alinghi comes from the childhood imagination of Ernesto Bertarelli and on Wednesday the billionaire businessman celebrated a second America's Cup win with his Swiss boat.
Alinghi beat Team New Zealand in a thrilling seventh race to win the series 5-2 and retain the Auld
Mug.
Bertarelli has been a mad keen sailor since those childhood days on his family's wooden boat and despite a stellar career running a biotechnology company founded by his grandfather, the water and wind have always been his greatest passion.
Last year, the 41-year-old sold the family firm Serono to pharamaceutical group Merck for US$13.3 billion ($17.21 billion), pocketed a fortune himself and made sailing his fulltime job, living on his super yacht in Valencia and training with the Alinghi crew.
According to Forbes' latest list of billionaires, Bertarelli, who is married to a former beauty queen and has three children, is now the world's 76th richest man with a personal fortune of US$8.8 billion.
Having put his Harvard MBA to work to squeeze such huge value out of a family firm, Bertarelli has now turned his attention to pumping more money into and out of the world's oldest running sporting competition -- the America's Cup.
It is one of the dearly held traditions of the America's Cup that the winner takes all and can decide when and where to race the next one, which boats to use and how to run the show.
Since Alinghi won sailing's most coveted prize in 2003, the first Europeans ever to do so, Bertarelli and his right-hand man Michel Bonnefous have revolutionised the event, building in more inter-Cup racing, corporate hospitality and sponsorship.
Some critics say Bertarelli -- whose boat is crewed by a core of triple Cup-winning Kiwis -- has over-commercialised the event, robbing it of some of the romance of rich men battling it out for national pride rather than money.
For all the muttering and his reputation as a ruthless negotiator, Bertarelli has also shown a softer side in Valencia, grinning and chatting with crew members' families after races, taking the trash off his own multi-million yacht and playing sailing simulation games with friends at Alinghi's base.
Geneva-based Bertarelli is also far from simply being a billionaire bankrolling a boat. Rather he is an accomplished sailor with plenty of his own cups on his shelf and a keen interest in boat design.
As for his future, Bertarelli has said he might get back into health technology and there has been speculation he could get involved in Formula One.
For now, though, another edition of the America's Cup calls and a big businessman gets to keep living his childhood dreams.
- REUTERS