America's Cup: Team NZ steady ship against Oracle, move closer to glory

Emirates Team NZ in action against Oracle Team USA off Bermuda. Photo/Ricardo Pinto

Just two more wins stand between Team NZ and America's Cup glory, after another win over defenders Oracle Team USA off Bermuda.

The result was much needed to steady the nerves, after the Americans captured their first victory and closed to 4-1 the first-to-seven format yesterday, resurrecting ghosts of San Francisco for years ago, when Oracle came back from 8-1 down to retain the Auld Mug.

Today dawned with lighter winds than yesterday, but Emirates Team NZ helmsman Peter Burling controlled the pre-start and led rival Jimmy Spithill across the line by about a boat length, holding a three-second margin at the first mark.

The Kiwis have not lost a race where they lead around the first mark and lost when they trailed for the first time yesterday.

"We've got a pretty impressive bunch of designers in the chase [boat], tweaking it and making sure our starting package is as good as it can be," said Burling.

"I think that's showed over the last couple of days, we've had quite a few starts within about a metre of the line, doing over 30 knots. We're really happy with the package they've given us."

The 6-7 knot winds meant foiling was marginal at times, with both ACC boats falling off in early tacks.

Ahead by five seconds through the second gate, Burling chose to separate upwind and found the best of the wind to stretch his advantage to 32 seconds by the next rounding.

Team NZ found a decisive puff down the right boundary of the fourth leg to further extend the margin.

Spithill made up some ground upwind with a tacking strategy and forced a split around the top gate, but the advantage was still 400 metres with time and distance running out.

They made up 20 seconds down that leg, but Team NZ had more than enough to see them home for a 5-1 scoreline.

"We said last night we had a fair few things to work on and we addressed them today," said Burling. "I think that showed through upwind speed.

"It's an incredibly shifty day and we tried to consolidate a little bit halfway up that second beat and let them get a bit closer, but it felt like we had pretty minimal risk that whole race."

Spithill reflected ruefully on another one that got away, despite superior average speeds both upwind and down.

"Those guys just got off the line better than us. We pulled the trigger a little late and it was very difficult to come back."

35th America's Cup match
Race 7: Emirates Team New Zealand beat Oracle Team USA by 12 secs
Race 8: 5.57am
Team New Zealand lead the first-to-seven series 5-1