Defenders of Cup official and firing

By SUZANNE McFADDEN

Team New Zealand have entered a new era.

The America's Cup champions were handed the keys to the next defence yesterday, after surviving the storm of dramas and defections over the past two months.

But Team NZ have not been waiting for the waters to calm.

New boats have already been drawn for 2003 and the new crew of tyros are sailing around the world before going on holiday together. That old Black Magic, NZL32, has been chartered to a rival syndicate.

Yesterday was the end of the 2000 era, as the door finally closed at the old Team NZ office across the street from the big black shed.

Sir Peter Blake packed the last box and handed his security card over to his close friend and new Team NZ chief, Ross Blackman.

A street divided the syndicate last time - Sir Peter on one side and skipper Russell Coutts on the other.

But this time everyone will be on the same side of Syndicate Row in the purpose-built base, which still stands while others around it have been pulled down.

Yesterday, the shore crew were putting together NZL32, the boat that won the 95 Cup, ready for another Cup team.

The original Black Magic has been chartered to Swiss challenge Watch Out (no relation to the Coutts Swiss syndicate).

The boat will stay in Auckland, with the Swiss sailing it on the Hauraki Gulf this summer. In two years time, NZL32 will be returned and then given to the Museum of New Zealand, Te Papa, in Wellington.

Its sister ship, NZL38, has been sold to a Swedish syndicate for $1 million.

New Team NZ skipper Dean Barker and some of his crew are in Sweden this weekend sailing in the next event on the world matchracing circuit.

In the meantime, another crew called Team NZ won the Nations Cup in Italy yesterday - a new regatta for America's Cup crews. But the team led by Coutts, who beat America True in the final, will no longer sail for New Zealand in the Cup.

The design team is swelling, and a couple of models have been drawn ready for tank-testing in England this spring.

The next phase for the defenders is working out the budget, determining how much they will need, before starting serious negotiations with the existing family of five sponsors.

Sir Peter predicts it will be at least $20 million more than the last defence, which cost about $50 million.

There were no emotional goodbyes yesterday for Sir Peter, who now heads the Cousteau Society. He will continue to help the Team NZ cause as an adviser.

"I don't feel I'm leaving," he said. "And anyway, I feel it's in very good hands - otherwise I would be concerned, very concerned."

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