Yachting: Team NZ retain lead despite loss

Aleph leads Team New Zealand to the top mark in the Louis Vuitton Cup. Photo / Paul Estcourt

Another day of weather disruptions has put the heat on Louis Vuitton Trophy organisers as they look to condense two days of round-robin racing into one.

Strong and gusty southwest winds forced a cancellation of yesterday's competition, but not before previously unbeaten Emirates Team New Zealand went down to France's seventh-placed Aleph.

Organisers are hoping to push through the remaining matches of yesterday's abandoned flight six and all matches scheduled for the final day of round robin-racing today.

The milder weather forecast for today will help their cause, but it is nevertheless an ambitious schedule, particularly given the number of gear breakages teams have experienced over the opening week of the regatta.

After a number of incidents last week, in recent days it has been the hosts who have fallen victim to gear failure.

Unlike on Sunday, when, despite a broken spinnaker pole, Team New Zealand recorded a solid victory over Italy's Azzurra team, the Kiwis were not so lucky against Aleph.

The French, skippered by Bertrand Pace, were well in charge when disaster struck for the locals after they rounded the top mark.

The Kiwis trailed into the mark on port, five boat lengths astern, when they ran into trouble as they trimmed their spinnaker to chase the French.

The clew exploded out of the chute, taking metres of sail cloth with it and the Kiwis were forced to dump the halyard and jettison the sail, leaving their chase boat to pick up the debris.

Team NZ strategist Adam Beashel described the day as "one of the worst races we've sailed in a long time".

"We were on the wrong side of the first two shifts of the first beat. Aleph did a great job sticking to their game plan and staying in the left and doing well out of that and putting a bit of pressure on us."

Racing is scheduled to start at the earlier time of 9.30am today.