America's Cup hook-ups and love taps - sounds like a dating site

Team New Zealand boss Grant Dalton - no more Mr Nice Guy. Photo / JasonOxenham

Is it the America's Cup? Or is it a dating site?

The boats returned to more meaningful practice in Bermuda, Sunday, after a few days of frustratingly light airs. But these incredible machines were flying solo, so to speak.

"They are laying down a course tomorrow and so it will be interesting to see who hooks up with who," said one of our spies. Which got us thinking about the dating analogy.

What's been going on in Bermuda often sounds like Tinder, the dating app. The Tinder-type terms could be handy in Bermuda - delayed match, instant match, swipes, background check.

Let's be frank. Exactly which boat parts are the combatants checking out? And just how much foil should someone show on these initial dates in Bermuda? Not as much as Team New Zealand did in San Francisco seems to be the answer.

As in dating, sometimes the yachting works out, sometimes it doesn't. Brit Ben Ainslie had a crush on Team New Zealand last week, but not in a good way. It wasn't so much a right swipe, but a wrong one.

For Tinder, read America's Cup. A lot of people like to bag both, but the numbers say something else. As with Tinder, skeptics claimed new technology would ruin romance, but the world's oldest sports competition is hotter than ever.

For now, everyone is putting up their best photos, mainly pretending how nice they are, saying all the right things, even apologising when things go wrong.

The terminology is deceptive, full of hidden meaning. Ainslie described last week's crash as a "love tap", without sounding like a man looking for love. (In the interests of avoiding anything too obvious or crass, we are not going to mention grinding).

One does tend to feel that the honeymoon is almost over with racing proper starting this weekend. True feelings are about to emerge and Team New Zealand boss Grant Dalton even says as much, declaring he will retaliate if under threat.

The defenders, Oracle Team USA, have a history of relationships with most of the other teams. They are still on very good terms, but will it stay that way?

Because anyone who has been around the block a few times with the America's Cup knows what comes next. If practice equals clumsy dating, the Louis Vuitton and America's Cup racing is a volatile marriage.

With passionate characters driving yachts pushing new frontiers of design, it might even be 'till depths do us part'.