America's Cup yachties Chris Dickson and Cameron Appleton will join Team New Zealand skipper Dean Barker in the New Zealand match-racing championships on the Waitemata Harbour this week.
Dickson and Appleton finished first and second in the qualifying series held over the weekend. Also qualifying for the main event wereSimon Dickey and Brian Trubovich.
The regatta came to an early end yesterday after light winds meant only one flight was completed.
Dickson, BWM Oracle Racing's chief executive and skipper, won all four of his races on Saturday but lost to Graeme Sutherland yesterday.
The match-racing championship is a four-day regatta starting on Thursday.
The 10 teams will compete in a double round-robin competition to decide the semifinalists. The semifinals are then a first-to-two-wins series and the final the first to three wins.
Barker, who will sail with Emirates Team New Zealand team-mates James Dagg, Jared Henderson, Terry Hutchinson and Don Cowie, is the defending champion.
The other skippers in the main draw are Tom Powrie, Simon Minoprio, Adam Minoprio and Laurie Jury from the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron, and Takumi Nakamura of the Wakayama Marina City Yacht Club.
* In the round-the-world yacht race Mike Sanderson's ABN Amro 1 (Netherlands) had a 71-nautical-mile lead over ABN Amro 2 yesterday.
Sanderson's team were 3723 nautical miles from Cape Town.
Brasil 1 (Brazil) are third 84 miles behind and the Ericsson Racing team (Sweden) fourth 88 miles behind.
