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BMW Oracle, Alinghi, 33rd America's Cup in Valencia 14 February 2010 (photo: ©Carlo Borlinghi / Alinghi)

Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Alinghi’s president, Ernesto Bertarelli, has taken an upbeat tone about the future, now that the team’s solid defeat at the hands of BMW Oracle in the 33rd America’s Cup sailing race is behind him. He praised the resilience of his team in a statement on the Geneva-based Alinghi’s web site Wednesday 17 February, part of an announcement that the boat and its team will celebrate Alinghi’s 10th birthday in September 2010.

“Alinghi has had a fantastic run in the America’s Cup. We created this team 10 years ago.

“We were the first team to win the America’s Cup from Europe in the history of this wonderful event. We were the first team to defend it successfully and put together a fantastic show in Valencia. This 33rd America’s Cup with these gigantic multihulls will always be remembered as a very unique, very special, very extraordinary event.

“Alinghi has always been a team that has been about winning. But winning is also accepting the risk of losing. It’s part of the game,” Bertarelli notes. “It’s a hard game, the America’s Cup, and today for the first time in 10 years we are defeated.

We have to accept that there was a better team with a fantastic design achievement, the wing, which generated an incredible amount of power for their boat.”

Bertarelli and BMW Oracle’s chief executive Russell Coutts have both begun to talk about a 34th America’s Cup with fair rules for all. Coutts announced Monday 15 February that Club Nautico di Roma, and its sailing team Mascalzone Latino, is the Challenger of Record for the 34th America’s Cup. Coutts says that details of the next edition “will come following a period of consultation with the America’s Cup community.

“There will be independent management of all competitive aspects of the regatta,” Coutts says. “I think that’s important for all of the competitors, to know the rules will be fair and equal for all.”