BMW-Oracle says Alinghi's sails not made in Switzerland
Update 18:35 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – America’s Cup challenger BMW-Oracle and defender Alinghi are set to go back to court in New York after negotiations broke down in Singapore 12 January. The two sailing teams and their boats are in Valencia, Spain to contest sailing’s oldest and most prestigious race, a best of three meets that begins 8 February. Final details of the rules for the races are under discussion, but a sticking point lately has been the source of Alinghi’s sails.
BMW-Oracle maintains that Alinghi’s sail, made in the USA, violates the Deed of Gift’s stipulation that the boat be entirely built in the country the team represents, in this case Switzerland, home of the Société Nautique de Genève (SNG). The Deed of Gift is the document that lays down the ground rules for the 159-year-old race. Alinghi says bluntly that BMW-Oracle has it wrong.
Alinghi in Valencia. © 2010 Jose Delgado / Alinghi
Valencia, Spain (GenevaLunch) – Both defending champion Alinghi and US challenger BMW Oracle have arrived in the port of Valencia for final preparations before the series of three races that kicks off 8 February. The Alinghi team has been unloading the ship that transported containers, masts and other material from the Persian Gulf port of Ras Al Khaimah. The BMW Oracle trimaran, BOR 90, arrived in port a day earlier.
Alinghi is featured at a special exhibition at Nyon’s Musée du Léman which shows the extent to which Lake Geneva boating traditions and knowledge as well as Swiss high-tech technology in the form of composite materials and design from EPFL contributed to the making of the America’s Cup defender.
Other links: Alinghi, BMW Oracle
Alinghi to race in Valencia
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Alinghi sailing team will face its challenger BMW-Oracle in Valencia, Spain, in the best of three races in February 2010. Société Nautique de Genève (SNG), the Geneva, Switzerland sailing club that Alinghi represents, says that the Golden Gate Yacht Club, which is represented by BMW-Oracle, has not replied to its suggestion a week ago that the race be held in waters off the east coast of Australia. Thus the only other venue open to it legally, in order to comply with the February date, is Valencia.
BMW-Oracle with mast, photo by Gilles Martin-Raget
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Team Alinghi has suggested a venue for the 33rd America’s Cup race with challenger BMW-Oracle off the coast of Australia, in order “unlock” the race and “return the competition to the water”. The announcement 5 November comes a day before a hearing in the New York Supreme Court scheduled to determine whether Alinghi’s favoured venue in Ras al-Khaimah, United Arab Emirates will be upheld by the court.
Justice Shirley Kornreich had ruled 27 October that Alinghi must choose a southern hemisphere location or Valencia, Spain for the race in February. The ongoing legal battle between the two teams threatened to postpone the actual race. Alinghi appealed that decision.
