Yachting: Italians set standard

By Suzanne McFadden

Prada's silver bullet shot through two rival challengers on the first day of the America's Cup regatta yesterday, but they almost lost a man in the gunfight.

The Italians gave an early indication of what many had predicted - that they have a fast boat, but their crew work still needs a little polishing.

On the opening day of the Louis Vuitton Cup challenger series ruled by shifty winds and rain squalls, Prada's silver boat, ITA45, toppled the sadly lacking Swiss boat then outgunned Japan's big hope, Nippon, by over two minutes.

But in the latter race, the Italians almost lost one of their grinders, who toppled into the chilly waters of the Hauraki Gulf in a mark-rounding blunder.

Simone di Mari (which would loosely translate as Simon of the Sea) was caught in the jib sheet as the Prada crew grappled with their spinnaker drop at the end of a close second leg.

Di Mari was rescued, but the sail was cut away.

"I didn't notice until I was told that somebody was almost sinking," said skipper Francesco de Angelis. "We had to do a hard job instead of making an easy one."

The Italians managed to overcome their problem and escaped to the right-hand side of the course where they wanted to be, scoring a notable victory.

Yesterday was de Angelis' America's Cup debut.

But making his eighth cup appearance was the king himself, Dennis Conner, who knew he could not afford to lose a sail on day one.

Conner's Stars & Stripes had just one race yesterday, and looked to be a convincing winner against Le Defi France.

But when the wind shifted in the final run to the line, his straining spinnaker threatened to explode.

Conner did not want to lose $50,000 on the first day of the campaign, so he pulled the spinnaker in, albeit in ungainly fashion, and still held on to win by nine seconds.

Conner steered the boat for one-third of the race, including the final leg.

"I raced my guts out for an hour and a half," said helmsman Ken Read, with a big grin. "Then DC took the helm and in a few seconds he cut the margin down from nearly two minutes to just a couple of boat lengths. It takes a real America's Cup veteran to do that."

He was joking, of course.

After two races there are four unbeaten challengers - Prada, AmericaOne, Young America and Stars & Stripes.

But after such flukey breezes, which rarely rose above eight knots, the scoresheet does not give an accurate indication of who is fastest.

America True, sailing with three women in the crew, suffered two losses to countrymen yesterday, but they showed good speed downwind.

Yet they struggled upwind, losing to Young America by 37s, and then blew the start against AmericaOne, crossing the line too soon.

But AmericaOne tactician John Kostecki said their fellow San Franciscans in the True crew gave them a close run until the final leg.

Hawaiians Abracadabra 2000 almost pulled a rabbit out of their hat when they pushed Nippon to the edge in their opening race, but the Japanese eventually won by 41s.

In the afternoon, Abracadabra and its striking midnight blue sails simply dealt to the Swiss Fast2000 campaign.

After losing to Prada by more than four minutes the Be Happy boat trailed the Hawaiians by over 10 minutes at the finish-line. The Spanish had a tough first draw, losing to Young America and AmericaOne.