Elimination Races In America’s Cup Yachting

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31560, 23 December 1967, Page 15

Elimination Races In America’s Cup Yachting

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) NEW YORK. Four nations—Australia, England, France and Greece — will get a chance in 1970 of wresting the America’s Gup 12-metre yachting trophy from the United States, which has held it for 116 years. Associated Press reported.

The New York Yacht Club yesterday announced plans for a “round-robin” series of elimination races to determine the next challenger.

The eliminations will be held off Newport, Rhode Island, in 1970, prior to the America’s Cup series probably in September. Australia and France already had agreed to an elimination series, and word is

expected in the near future from England and Greece, Their decisions must be made by July 1, 1968.

This marks the first time that France and Greece have challenged for the cup.

Commodore Chubb was asked if the present unrest in Greece—the flight of King Constantine and the rise of a military junta—might affect the challenge. He replied: “The challenge was received before all this happened. We have not heard that the situation is changed or is not changed.” The proposed elimination races are an innovation in America’s Cup racing, and are designed to permit the strongest possible challenge for the cup, both through the selection of the best qualified challenger and by providing an opportunity for the challenging yacht to be tuned to its highest ranking efficiency under competitive conditions. Final details on how the elimination trials will be con-

ducted have yet to be decided. “These are just the ground rules,” Commodore Chubb said.

Newport was chosen as the tournament site because yachts would be sailing in conditions they would meet during the actual cup races. A regional elimination tournament sue as conducted in the Davis Cup tennis competition would be impracticable because of the enormous cost c transporting the racing sloops.

While the New York Yacht Club will be able to assist in the holding of the elimination races, it is contemplated that the races themselves will be managed by a team of international judges, in which the New York Yacht Club will not participate. The United States has never lost the trophy, defending against England Australia and Canada. Last year Intrepid, skippered by B. Mosbacher, defeated Australia’s Dame Pattie, 4-0.