Wednesday,
May 09, 2007
The
ANNOTICO Report
Team
Team
NZ as top ranker gets to choose their opponents for the best-of-nine semifinals
beginning on Tuesday, and choose
The
winners of those two semi Finals will face off for the right to face defending
Champion "Alinghi" from landlocked
As
Champion "Alinghi" had the choice of cities
to host the
This
is the first time in 156 years that America's Cup has been held in
Europe, and there has been a decided effort to make it less elitist, (it
was held in Newport R.I. for 50 odd years), and more spectator friendly by
making the races shorter, and closer to shoreline, which has been
enthusiastically responded to.
That
is awesome!!!!!! As a result, tourism has been 5 times greater than in 1991. A million people
alone are expected for the Finals of the
By
AssociatedPress
April
30, 2007
"To be here
over the last 20 years has been very humbling -- it's a big success because the
city has totally changed," said Jose Salinas, director of Valencia Tourism
since 1991. "
Tourists have
responded, just as they did with
In recent years,
Better travel
connections, including the rise of low-cost European airlines, the advent of
the Internet, expansion in the number of hotels, conference halls, museums and
art galleries are why
Tourist arrivals
in
Designed by the
superstar architect Santiago Calatrava, who happens
to be a native son, the $334 million palace is part of a complex of museums and
other attractions called the City of
As in
Valencia's City
of Arts and Sciences is set within the Turia Gardens,
a drained river renovated into a park in the 1990s, and Calatrava's
next work will be here also, a 230-foot-tall public square to be completed in
2008. "Agora" will be dwarfed only by the neighboring "
Mayor Rita Barbera has overseen the renovation of 64 historic sites in
the city at a cost of $241 million during her 16-year tenure. Not since the
15th century has this mercantile city -- still known for its UNESCO-protected
silk markets -- seen such a renaissance.
Barbera and
With the
"It was a
win-win situation. Thanks to the
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/
Big win puts Team NZ on top
Stuff.com
NZ
Thursday,
10 May 2007
Team New Zealand
sailed to an emphatic victory over Oracle Racing off Valencia today to regain
top ranking going into the knockout stages of the America's Cup challengers'
series.
TEAM NZ CHOOSE SPANISH FOR SEMIS
The result leapfrogged
Team NZ above their American rivals on the leaderboard
and gave them the right to choose their opponents for the best-of-nine semifinals
beginning on Tuesday (NZ time).
The showdown between two
heavyweights on the last day of the round-robin phase had been expected to be a
tight affair, with Oracle going in as favourites.
But it became no contest
shortly after the start, as NZL92 sought out and hooked on to a windshift.
From there, skipper Dean
Barker and his crew opened out a huge gap on the way to one minute 34 second
victory.
Syndicate head Grant
Dalton said Team NZ had approached the encounter no differently than any other
in the regatta.
"We put together a
game plan that suited the conditions," he said.
"We got a good call
from the weather team. Then Dean and the boys performed a perfect
execution."
"We built a good
lead quite quickly and from then the plan was simply to keep our boat between
USA98 and the finish mark," he said.
"We didn't have an
anxious moment during the entire race."
After losing three of their
10 matches in the first round-robin, Team NZ were unbeaten in the second,
avenging defeats to Oracle and another of the semifinalists,
Today's contest with
USA98, sailed in a 10 to 12-knot sea breeze, featured 25 New Zealanders among
the 34 sailors on the two boats, including 11 on Oracle.
After a tense pre-start,
in which Oracle skipper Chris Dickson threatened to luff
NZL92, the two yachts hit the line side by side and with good speed.
But while Oracle stuck to
the left-hand side of the course, Team NZ headed for the right.
When Barker tacked back,
the lateral separation was huge with USA98 a couple of boat lengths in front,
but as the wind shifted right NZL92 powered ahead.
By the top mark, the
margin was 54sec and Team NZ made gains on each subsequent leg.
Not event a small rip in
their spinnaker after the final gybe on the run home
proved a problem.
Luna Rossa
defeated fellow semifinalists Desafio Espanol by a comfortable 1min 54sec in a match that had no
bearing on the standings, as the Italians already had third spot sewn up.
Luna Rossa's
Australian helmsman, James Spithill, won the
pre-start against Desafio's No 2, Dane Jesper Radich.
From there, the Italians
chose the favoured side of the course and held the
lead throughout the journey.
The Spanish didn't help
their cause when they copped a penalty for draping their spinnaker over the top
mark.
There were also wins for
Italians Mascalzone Latino and +39 Challenge,
and for
But victory was tinged
with disappointment, as the trio are in the group of
seven syndicates who will now be packing up for home.
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