THE LEGENDARY AMERICA’S CUP THE TROPHY and THE RACE

by Karolina Stefanski and Jack Griffin

What is the America’s Cup?

The pinnacle of the sport of sailing and the oldest international trophy in sports, the America’s Cup is probably the most difficult to win. The trophy has been held by yacht clubs from only four countries—the United States, Australia, New Zealand and, somewhat improbably, Switzerland. For 170 years, this yachting competition has attracted nobles and titans of industry who have spent fortunes in a grand quest for the prestige of winning this elusive prize.

The America’s Cup, a silver ewer crafted by Garrard’s, the Crown Jewelers, was first awarded as a prize in 1851 by the Royal Yacht Squadron (RYS) in Cowes, England, at their annual regatta. Queen Victoria’s husband, Prince Albert

(1819-1861), was an active member of the RYS. Albert played the leading role in organizing the Great Exhibition (1851), the showcase for British industrial might. Six million visitors attended 13,000 exhibits in Paxton’s

Crystal Palace in London in 1851.1 Nations from around the globe brought their latest cultural, technological and technical developments and innovations, showcased in elaborate displays. Inspired by this international spirit, the RYS

England.

William offered a trophy for a race open to “Yachts belonging to the Clubs of all Nations”2 (Figure 1). The trophy had been purchased at Garrard’s for £100 and presented to the squadron by Lord Uxbridge, the Marquess of Anglesey (1768-1854), a founding member of the club and a hero of the Battle of Waterloo (1815).

The trophy for the first race was won by the yacht America (Figure 2), owned by a syndicate of five members of the New York Yacht Club. The upstart New Yorkers had built a fast yacht modelled on the pilot boats that raced out to incoming clipper ships. The first boat to reach a clipper would put their pilot on board, collecting the fee for guiding the ship into New York harbor. The others went home empty handed. During the race, as America rounded the Needles at the western end of the Isle of Wight, Queen Victoria, aboard the royal yacht, asked her signal master, “Which yacht is leading?” “It’s the America,” came the reply. “And who is second?” The signal master exclaimed, “There is no second, ma’am”3 and so it is to this day in the competition - only the winner counts. There is no second. “The loss of the cup so rattled British yachtsmen that they fell prey to all kinds of suspicions, including the idea that America was secretly steam powered.”4 The Marquess

America’s

August 22, 1851 of Anglesey, donor of the cup, had lost his right leg in the Battle of Waterloo, but was still an active yachtsman.5 When he scrambled aboard America, John Cox Stevens (1785-1857), founder and the first commodore of the New York Yacht Club and leader of the America syndicate, held his good leg so he could lean over the side to look for a propeller. Finding none and realizing that America’s hull shape was superior to British designs, he declared, “I’ve been sailing my yacht stern foremost for the last twenty years.”6

Taking their prize back to New York, the five syndicate members at first thought of melting it down to make a medallion for each of them.7 Fortunately, they came up with a better idea, and gifted the Cup to their club, specifying, “This Cup is donated upon the condition that it shall be preserved as a perpetual Challenge Cup for friendly competition between foreign countries.”8 The America’s Cup is named for the yacht that first won it, not for the country. The yacht club which last won the Cup holds it until a challenging yacht club - always from a different country than the defender - defeats it. The New Yorkers held the trophy for 132 years - the longest winning streak in any sport. In 1983, Australia’s Royal Perth Yacht Club wrested the Cup from the defender’s team led by Dennis Conner. Conner promptly won the trophy back in the next edition in 1987, this time representing the San Diego Yacht Club. In 1988, a surprise challenge from New Zealand led to two years of legal wrangling and a mismatched competition between an elegant but slow Kiwi monohull and a speedy American catamaran. San Diego Yacht Club kept the Cup until 1995, when the Kiwis prevailed and took it back to the Southern Hemisphere for two more editions. In 2003, a challenge from Switzerland recruited top Kiwi sailors and won the Cup, taking it to Europe for the first time, with racing in Valencia, Spain. More legal battles raged from 2007 to 2010. An American team owned by software billionaire Larry Ellison won in the courts of New York and on the waters of Valencia, taking the trophy to San Francisco in 2013 and then to Bermuda in 2017. The America’s Cup went to New Zealand once again, following a successful challenge by the Kiwis in Bermuda. The most recent competition was the thirty-sixth challenge for the America’s Cup and was raced in Auckland, New Zealand, in March 2021. Three teams challenged for the right to meet Emirates Team New Zealand in the America’s Cup Match:

(1) Prada Pirelli Team Luna Rossa, representing Italy’s Cercolo della Vela Sicilia; (2) American Magic, representing

“The modern America’s Cup racer bears not the slightest resemblance to any useful craft in the world, and she does not even contribute to the development of yachting as a true sport apart from the satisfaction of an illogical national vanity. But having damned them, I must confess to an absorbing interest in the problems set by those extraordinary craft. They have the fascination of sin.”

- Yacht Designer Charles Burgess. 1935

New York Yacht Club; and (3) INEOS Team UK, representing Royal Yacht Squadron Racing. Racing in the Prada Cup Challenger Selection Series took place during January and February, with Luna Rossa emerging as the top challenger. They raced against Team New Zealand for the big prize in March. This intensely spirited regatta captivated serious sailing aficionados and fascinated casual sports fans. The Kiwi team fought off a determined challenge from Luna Rossa to retain the Cup for the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron. The America’s Cup is first and fore- most a technology and design contest.

In 1851 America stunned the British yachtsmen, with her hull shape, sharply raked masts, and tightly woven cotton sails. Winning America’s Cup yachts have always used the best technology of their day, and the designers have used all their skill to give their sailors a winning yacht. We have evolved from elegant wooden yachts with clouds of white canvas sails to today’s carbon fiber boats that fly above the water on hydrofoils. Extreme yachts built solely to race for this trophy has often been criticized for being impractical. Over eighty-five years ago, yacht designer Charles Burgess wrote, “The modern America’s Cup racer bears not the slightest resemblance to any useful craft in the world, and she does not even contribute to the development of yachting as a true sport apart from the satisfaction of an illogical national vanity. But having damned them, I must confess to an absorbing interest in the problems set by those extraordinary craft. They have the fascination of sin.”9

The America’s Cup has no governing body like the IOC or FIFA; the competition is governed by the Deed of Gift, 10 the nineteenth-century