America's Cup: Team NZ starts well but Oracle scores two wins

Oracle Team USA won two back-to-back races with a superior performance on San Francisco Bay today, putting it just one more win away from holding on to the America's Cup.

The series is now tied 8-8 with just the deciding race left. Earlier indications of high winds tomorrow suggest the race may not be held until Friday (NZ time).

The wins give Oracle a run of seven successive victories and holding the moral high ground, given it was penalised before the start of the series with two negative wins it had to make up. That means it has won 10 races on the water.

Emirates Team New Zealand gained the advantage in race 18 but it was not enough to hold off Oracle, which staged a dramatic overtaking manoeuvre after recovering from a poor start.

Team NZ led by 5s around the first marker and by 7s at the second marker heading into the upwind leg.

The lead then changed in a tacking duel halfway up the leg, with Oracle pulling ahead of Team NZ.

Oracle rounded the top (third) marker and immediately went into high-speed mode, leaving Team NZ trailing by 57s into to the downward leg.

Team NZ closed the gap to 49s at the fourth marker but Oracle won convincingly by 54s.

Race 17 in detail
Oracle Team USA bolted away at the start to win race 17 on San Francisco Bay, taking the series to 8-7.

Emirates Team New Zealand's hopes of winning the cup now depend on today's second race.

Another win to Oracle, which has now won six on the trot, would deadlock the series with one deciding race left.

Team NZ incurred two penalties at the start and had no hope of catching up.

At one point, the two boats collided as the aggressive Team NZ starting tactics failed.

Oracle soon established a long lead of around 500m or 29s at the bottom second market after leading by 16s at the first marker.

Although the lead narrowed, Oracle held its advantage for the second long upwind leg to the top mark against a strong tide flow.

Oracle led by 19s at the marker for the downwind leg as Team NZ continued to close the gap.

But at 300m Oracle was never threatened when reached the final marker with a 17s for the run to the finish. Oracle won by 27s.

Earlier report
Emirates Team New Zealand remains on match point in the America’s Cup with two races scheduled on San Francisco Bay today.

Conditions are windier than yesterday with Predictwind saying they will be 15-18 knots. If the first race starts as scheduled at 8.15am (NZ time), it will enable both races to be completed within the TV broadcast deadline of 10am.

However, if Team NZ wins the first race, the cup is theirs with the best-to-nine series at 8-6. At day 18, it is now the longest in cup history.

One hopeful portent for Team NZ: team manager Grant Dalton is back on board as a grinder after missing several races through injury.

But Team NZ will not have the advantage of port entry, which has proved crucial in most races.

Some consider the true winner of the cup will emerge today regardless as both contestants have eight wins each on the water in the series so far.

A Team NZ victory, even if it loses the next race, could prove pyrrhic as Oracle Team USA started with a penalty of negative-two wins and is likely to challenge this through legal action.

The only moral counter to this is that Team NZ was leading in two races that were abandoned because of high wind or too little. A third was aborted at the start with Team NZ in pole position.

Race 16 lost at the start
A confident Team NZ, starting with the port entry, blew yesterday’s race 16 in the first minute. Further insights have come in a commentary by Sail-World’s America’s Cup editor Richard Gladwell:

“Today's Error by Emirates Team NZ was hoisting the Code Zero before the start, in the belief that the wind was light enough to make it worthwhile on Leg 1. But that was not to be, and the additional drag from the furled sail was sufficient to allow Oracle Team USA to get foiling a few seconds sooner, which translated into a rare lead for the starboard entry boat at Mark 1.

"Oracle was never headed – and the speeds between the boats upwind and down were very comparable. The race was lost in the first 60 seconds, by one error.”

Gladwell notes the the boats are now sailing in a tighter wind range of around 10kts instead of an initial 28kts, taking away most of the advantage of the New Zealand boat’s design.

“For the New Zealanders the only option seems to be less cautious at the start, getting their timed runs right, and hitting the line at top speed and being much more aggressive tactically. Their basic package has been designed for a wider range of conditions and can't be changed too much.”

Meanwhile, Oracle backer Larry Ellison has been hosting 60,000 delegates at OracleWorld, his software company’s annual conference for developers and clients. It also includes a large media contingent, no doubt giving the Oracle team a further boost to its record of five successive wins.