Schnackenberg likely to play different role in Team NZ

11.45am

Americas Cup yachting veteran Tom Schnackenberg is likely to play a different role in Team New Zealand's next challenge, the team's new boss said today.

"Tom Schnackenberg in the role that he was, where he had direct responsibility for the boat, he will not be in that role any more," Team NZ managing director Grant Dalton said today.

Instead, Schnackenberg, who was previously syndicate head, was likely to be appointed as an adviser to Dalton, reporting to him on a daily basis.

"...he's invaluable, but to put him a area of full responsibility would be wrong," Dalton told National Radio.

The proposed role change for Schnackenberg's comes after a frank report released yesterday detailed the team's disastrous Cup defence earlier this year.

NZL82 was beaten 5-0 by America's Cup Swiss challenger Alinghi in early March, after a series of equipment failures on the water.

The report said the single most important reason for the loss was the management structure adopted after skipper Russell Coutts and tactician Brad Butterworth defected to Alinghi.

"The most critical weakness was that no one individual had a total overview of where the team was at and final responsibility for and authority over decision making," the report said.

Instead, skipper Dean Barker was in charge of sailing, Tom Schnackenberg, design and Ross Blackman, administration, and all three reported back to the board.

"The management structure adopted by a 'recovering' Team New Zealand was absolutely the right one at the time," the report said.

Those responsible for the management structure were directors Peter Menzies, Ralph Norris, John Risley and Kevin Roberts along with Barker, Blackman and Schnackenberg.

The latter three have all been offered positions in the new set-up under Dalton.

Dalton said changes to the team's board of directors was to be expected.

"You can expect the board to take a pretty hard look at itself as well."

Schnackenberg was not immediately available for comment.

Another key part of the loss detailed in the report, prepared by Menzies, was the failure of the Team NZ's training boat NZL81, which undermined its confidence in their race boat NZL82.

NZL82 finished only three of its five races against Alinghi.

The report also said the team was poorly prepared to defend the Cup.

"As invariably happens in such situations, unseasonable weather and sea conditions further exposed and compounded the poor state of readiness," the report said.

Menzies said there was not a set programme for the review of Team NZ's operations.

"...within the coming months obviously these discussions will crystalise and plans for lodging a challenge in Europe for the Cup will also have some bearing on the composition of the board.

"I think the question is being able to talk to everybody rather than taking our time about it.

"The process that the discussions go through, looking at what is the right composition of the board will take time. It won't be delayed unnecessarily," he told National Radio today.

Meanwhile, the team's principal sponsors had accepted the report into the loss of the Cup.

"They are of course disappointed with the result. None of us like losing.

"They've been very constructive in their approach to it and they will obviously be included in discussion with the board for lodging a challenge (in the future)," he said.

Schnackenberg said today: "I think it's going fine. I'll leave it at that."

He declined to comment further.

- NZPA

Why we lost the Cup -- extracts from the Team NZ report

Further reading: nzherald.co.nz/americascup