After over two years of down and dirty legal battles between America's Cup defender Team Alinghi, owned by Ernesto Bertarelli and based in Switzerland, and America's Cup Challenger of Record BMW/ORACLE, owned by Larry Ellison and backed by the Golden Gate Yacht Club in San Francisco, the race for the America's Cup is back on.
The following letter from Tom Ehman, Golden Gate Yacht Club Spokesperson, was sent today to all concerned parties, including New York Supreme Court Justice Kornreich and Société Nautique de Genève, the Organising Authority for the event:
"New York, NY -- November 10, 2009 - We're very pleased to see that Société Nautique de Geneve/Alinghi have finally agreed with us that Valencia in February is the correct venue to hold the 33rd America's Cup. Presumably SNG will now drop their appeal of the Court's decision that Ras Al Khaimah is an illegal venue."
An official Notice of Race was immediately published by Société Nautique de Genève, announcing that the 33rd America’s Cup Match will take place in Valencia, Spain, from February 1st, 2010 to February 25th, 2010, weather conditions permitting.
This agreement puts a stop to the back-and-forth legal battles between the two camps over where and when the two-boat match race would be held. Possible venues included Ras Al Khaimah, a United Arab Emirate, Auckland, New Zealand, Sydney, Australia, and Valencia, Spain, site of the last America's Cup event which concluded on July 3, 2007, when Alinghi defeated Emirates Team New Zealand.
Alinghi and BMW/ORACLE had previously agreed to race large multi-hulls, instead of the usual America's Cup Class monohulls used in previous America's Cup matches.
Taking advantage of loopholes in the documents governing the defense and challenge for the Cup, BMW/ORACLE was able to secure a one-against-one match race against Alinghi, rather than the usual multi-team challenger series of fleet races and match races previously used to determine which team would eventually win the right to challenge the Cup defender.
Confused? You're in very good company. The legal challenges, and the legal bills, may surpass the complexity and cost of the boats themselves.
The last time such an odd America's Cup loop-hole challenge was made was in 1988, when New Zealander Sir Michael Fay challenged Dennis Conner and the San Diego Yacht Club, who then held the Cup, with a mono-hulled "monster boat". Conner, responding with a few deft legal loophole jumps of his own, defeated Sir Michael with a giant purpose-built catamaran, winning back the Cup.
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