They ruined his sleep but not his dreams

By Suzanne McFadden

Prada boss Patrizio Bertelli arrived at his syndicate base tired and angry early yesterday.

He had been kept awake until 3 am by music blaring from the base of his opponents, AmericaOne, and he wanted revenge.

When he reached the Prada base at 7 am, Bertelli, who lives in his wooden yacht Ulisse berthed directly across from the rival compound, directed all Prada's stereo speakers towards the AmericaOne base right next door.

And then he began playing the syndicate's theme, an old Neapolitan song called Luna Rossa, on repeat, perhaps hundreds of times before his boat left the dock.

Luna Rossa was usually the later boat to leave the Viaduct each day, but yesterday she was first off the rank, catching many supporters by surprise.

"They [the Prada crew] probably left early because they could not bear to listen to the song any more," quipped one Italian.

The ultra-superstitious Prada team asked people who had been on their support boat on Saturday to return to the water yesterday - wearing the same clothes - and bumping off the scheduled guests.

While music had left Mr Bertelli grumpy at the beginning of his day, it was a vastly different story late last night at the Prada base. With disco music blaring, the fashion mogul danced the night away with bikini-clad women and poured water over some of the 1000 partygoers in the compound.

At AmericaOne there was a more subdued gathering, but as the night wore on some Americans jumped the fence to join in, with no sign of bad feeling.

The Italians quickly scotched rumours that if Prada goes on to win the America's Cup they might hold the event back in Auckland.

Their fanatical followers - half a million of whom watched the victory on television until 4 am Italian time- would hardly be impressed if they did.