Yachting: Cup hull food for thought

Dean Barker. Photo / Brett Phibbs

Emirates Team New Zealand are in a familiar position - on top of a regatta points table amid a busy competition schedule - but skipper Dean Barker hopes the America's Cup does not put them in a "hull of a position".

Team NZ got back to the top of the points table in the Med Cup at Barcelona after the last three races in good breezes saw them finish first, third and second to lead US's Quantum Racing.

It was a satisfying display of consistency and part of the team's preparation for the next America's Cup - likely to be 2013.

A busy schedule over the next two years or so includes the Med Cup, the Louis Vuitton Trophy, Russell Coutt's RC44s competition (for some crew members only), the Volvo Ocean Race and the America's Cup itself.

There's just one thing. All the aforementioned involve monohulls. America's Cup holders BMW Oracle are conducting "television trials" off Valencia, designed to see what works best in terms of beefing up TV coverage for the 34th Cup regatta.

Oracle are deciding whether it will be sailed in monohulls or multi-hulls,although most observers believe they favour monohulls.

Barker hopes so. The TP52 ETNZ is sailing in Barcelona at the Med Cup, the boats for the scheduled Louis Vuitton Trophy regattas in Dubai and Hong Kong are single hulled. So is the RC44 class.

Barker is worried Oracle will opt for multi-hulls after their experience in taking the Cup off Alinghi in that unique, giant multi-hull clash where Oracle's enormous hi-tech trimaran romped home against Alinghi's enormous hi-tech catamaran to end years of tedious legal jousting.

"If they go down the multi-hulls road, they are giving themselves a massive head start," said Barker. "They are experienced in multi-hulls now and with things like hard wing sails and it is a lot of ground to make up - they could put themselves in a position where they could be almost unbeatable.

"That doesn't feel, at this stage, like it is quite right. You'd hope for an even playing field. It's a decision which could make it very hard for us to compete."

Ironically, similar sentences were applied to Alinghi in 2007 when the defender unveiled its latest set of rules for the 33rd Cup - producing the protests that eventually saw Oracle begin the court action.

"The good thing that most people bought into with Oracle was that they sounded committed to a multi-challenger event which suggested that even playing field," said Barker.

"But if they go for a multi-hull, it will put other teams in a position where it will be very, very hard to combat them. It's the prerogative of the defenders to set the rules, of course, but you hope, from a PR point of view, that speculation regarding multihulls isn't right."

Whatever the outcome, ETNZ is in for a busy few years. As well as the Med Cups, the LVT is likely to be folded into the America's Cup pre-regattas. No one yet knows if the Louis Vuittons will continue to be contested in borrowed, old America's Cup boats, or in a new class.

Meantime, ETNZ is doing what it does best - trying to win regattas and defend its Med Cup title.