Team New Zealand’s decision to take the Cup to Spain has stirred the pot, and critics aren’t holding back
by Amanda Gillies24/09/2024
Italy takes on Britain in the final of the America’s Cup challenger series, starting this week, with the winner set to race Team New Zealand in Barcelona next month.
But true to form, it is Brad Butterworth who is still claiming the headlines, despite his team, Alinghi Red Bull Racing, being defeated in the Louis Vuitton Cup semis.
He likens the way Team New Zealand is running the event to a communist state, claiming there is too much focus on money and not enough on pursuing a vision for the sport and building a wider partnership with competing teams, and insisting rivals are being shut-out of decision making.
America’s Cup correspondent Todd Niall broke the story and spoke to The Detail.
“It’s not unusual in an America’s Cup for one challenger or another at some point to have a go at the defender because the America’s Cup… rules are written by the defender in conjunction with a chosen challenger of record so the rules are often slightly tilted in favour of the defender, that’s what the America’s Cup is all about, so at some point someone is going to have a grumble,” he says.
“Brad is the master of the droll one-liner, the odd little quip,” Niall says, referring to Butterworth’s ‘communist state’ comment.
“That was a line that he threw in. I don’t think there is a great, long, warm relationship [between] him and Grant Dalton.”
Niall says Dalton told him in response that “if they don’t like it, be good enough to win it and set it up the way they want to.”
Journalist and sailor Richard Gladwell has been covering the America’s Cup since 1983. He would normally be waterside with Todd Niall.
But this year he is having to cover it from Auckland, due to costs and the programme.
“I’m not that enthused with the way it’s being run either,” he told The Detail. “It’s the way the media side has been set up, it’s completely Barcelona-orientated, they want to run an event that is quite sterile, whereas the America’s Cup is not about that, it’s all about the biffo.
“That starts on shore and continues on the water. The way they go about the design, and everyone is trying to second guess… it’s spy versus spy type stuff.
“That’s completely evaporated this Cup…. there’s also no media conference for the first time since forever… The PR people have really got this event by the throat”.
Both Niall and Gladwell believe Team New Zealand have the form to win the Cup but agree that “it’s sport, anything can happen”.
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2 Comments
- Glyn Walterssays:
24/09/2024 at 11:17 am
I just spent 10 days in Barcelonavisiting my brother (who has lived there for many years) and some old friends.No-one I talked to had a clue that the Americas’ Cup was about to start – theredid not appear to be much interest in it at all! Barcelonans are of courseobsessed with other things: soccer, art and architecture spring to mind. I hopethe sailing vibe increases when Kiwi fans arrive to support Team NZ – I hearsome are on their way there.
- Christopher Martinsays:
24/09/2024 at 5:48 pm
I am a kiwi, a sailor, and have been living on and off in Barcelona for 35 years and own an apartment there. I have been a volunteer with the 37th Americas Cup since the first preliminary regatta last year. In New Zealand, sailing and boating generally, is enjoyed by large swathes of the population. This is not the case in Spain; sailing is an elite sport for the well heeled. So when Grant Dalton took the cup to Barcelona for financial reasons, he knew he would have to market the event hard to gain the“hearts and minds” of the local population. And I have to say that media coverage of the event in Barcelona has been relatively intense, beginning almost two years ago with regular columns in local papers, online, and on the television. Many new Americas Cup sailing events have been created for this cycle: the AC40 series, womens series, youth series, etc. And there has been a lot of support put behind an historical Catalan racing catamaran, the Pati Catala, which has been much appreciated by the various clubs which race that class. However, despite these efforts and all the PR , the vast bulk of the local population still have no clue as to what the Americas Cup is all about, simply because they are not boating people. The event has brought money to Barcelona ;it’s difficult to imagine a greater concentration of superyachts anywhere, and they alone generate work and income wherever they go. However there is an underswell of discontent within the ranks of the Barcelona City Council, the organisation that signed off on a large cheque to Mr Dalton’s organisation in order to secure the rights to the event. They feel that the costs of running the event, and the return on investment, do not justify the expenditure. Does that sound familiar to noises that were emanating from the Auckland Council back in the day? That, plus growing local popular protest against the Americas Cup specifically and mass tourism generally in Barcelona, does not augur well for a return of the event to Barcelona next time around if Team New Zealand defend the Cup successfully in this cycle. As for Mr Butterworth’s comments, he is simply carrying on the time honoured Americas Cup tradition of stirring the pot, and if anyone knows anything about the AC, he does.