News
09.06.2010
Team Aqua stands the pressure and conquers the RC 44 Copenhagen Cup match race
Nine matches and eight victories: Cameron Appleton and his crewmembers on board Team Aqua have won the RC 44 Copenhagen Cup match race in style. BMW ORACLE Racing finishes second whilst Artemis completes the podium.
The pressure was on Team Aqua for the last day of the match race event. Unbeaten yesterday, Chris Bake’s team - helmed by Cameron Appleton - had three difficult duals ahead, against Team Sea Dubai, Ceeref and Artemis.
The first race of the day was a copy-paste of yesterdays’ for the Aqua boys, who benefited from their opponent’s premature start to sail away and win an easy point. Next came a race that could prove decisive, against Ceeref. The Slovenian team skippered by Rod Davis – second overall yesterday - had the mathematical possibility to win the contest by beating Aqua and then winning their last match against Paul Cayard’s Katusha, on little form in this event.
Team Aqua and Ceeref started even and exchanged tacks throughout the first beat. The decisive moment of the race took place when Aqua – on port tack – surprised Ceeref by dipping them, gaining the inside at the top mark and winning the race and the title thanks to this move. As for Ceeref, it went on to loose the next match against Katusha, ending up sixth overall…
Out of the five teams who were on a tie in third this morning, BMW ORACLE Racing, Artemis and No Way Back had the best day, winning three matches each and thus remaining on a tie, with BMW ORACLE Racing grabbing the second spot overall ahead of Artemis and No Way Back thanks to their direct confrontations.
Another happy team is the Austrian team AEZ, winner of their match against Paul Cayard’s Katusha and eighth overall – their best result in a match race so far. Team AEZ recently announced the appointment of Gerd Habermüller - a retired top bobsled athlete, 185 centimetres and 105 kilograms of muscles – and their team going from nine to eight crewmembers.
Tomorrow will be a practice day for the fleet regatta, due to start on Friday.
Match-race, final results after twelve flights:
(Ranking, name of team, helmsman, No of victories / defeats, points)
(Ranking, name of team, helmsman, No of victories / defeats, points)
1) Team Aqua (Cameron Appleton), 8/1 - 8 points
2) BMW ORACLE Racing (Russell Coutts / Larry Ellison), 6/3 - 6 points
3) Artemis (Terry Hutchinson), 6/3 - 6 points
4) Team No Way Back (Pieter Heerema / Ray Davies), 6/3 - 6 points
5) 17 (James Spithill), 5/4 - 5 points
6) CEEREF (Rod Davis), 5/4 - 5 points
7) Team Sea Dubai (Jes Gram Hansen), 4/5 - 3 points
8) AEZ RC 44 Sailing Team (Christian Binder), 2/7 - 2 points
9) Katusha (Paul Cayard), 2/7 - 2 points
10) Team Islas Canarias Puerto Calero (José Maria Ponce), 1/8 - 1 point
Cameron Appleton: “We knew that the match against Ceeref would be decisive but we didn’t want to do anything differently. It went our way: we wanted the left and we got the left; then we managed to dip them; we made as if we were going to tack, and then brutally bore away, which gave us the inside at the top mark. This has been a great series for us; I am very happy for the team and for myself. We’ve also had a lot of fun.”