Americas Cup - Wow!!!

[flaming]

I do.

Once there is a challenger of record then everything is between them and the defender.

Yes... But.... If that was strictly the case we never would have had the 2010 DOG match, as the NYSC stepped in to rule the CoR that Alinghi had chosen invalid and permitted a challenge from Oracle. Never assume that the court won't get involved, the only thing that Billionaires like less than being beaten in sailing events is being beaten by someone outsmarting them, and running to the court is the way to stop that.... Even that challenge didn't have to be a DOG match, it was the fact that Oracle and Alinghi agreed on fewer things about the America's cup than you and I do on the subject of the EU that then resulted in that challenge being a DOG match.

That said I'm not sure that ETNZ and Ineos are daft enough to construct anything that gives anyone any leverage to run to the court, but you can bet your life that money is being spent on legal opinions on that subject right now.

 

[bedouin]

Yes... But.... If that was strictly the case we never would have had the 2010 DOG match, as the NYSC stepped in to rule the CoR that Alinghi had chosen invalid and permitted a challenge from Oracle. Never assume that the court won't get involved, the only thing that Billionaires like less than being beaten in sailing events is being beaten by someone outsmarting them, and running to the court is the way to stop that.... Even that challenge didn't have to be a DOG match, it was the fact that Oracle and Alinghi agreed on fewer things about the America's cup than you and I do on the subject of the EU that then resulted in that challenge being a DOG match.

That said I'm not sure that ETNZ and Ineos are daft enough to construct anything that gives anyone any leverage to run to the court, but you can bet your life that money is being spent on legal opinions on that subject right now.

But wasn't that because it was a made up yacht club?

You are going to have problems saying RYS don't qualify as CoR

 

[flaming]

But wasn't that because it was a made up yacht club?

You are going to have problems saying RYS don't qualify as CoR

Yes, that was the lever that they used that time around.

Who's to say what it might be this time around?

Oh, and BTW, people ARE saying RYS is a made up yacht club, some American commentators anyway. Not the RYS itself, obviously, but because the RYS actually created an offshoot "Royal Yacht Squadron Racing" as a limited company in order to challenge for the cup whilst protecting the squadron from any potential financial fall out, and therefore they argue that "Royal Yacht Squadron Racing" does not run an annual regatta as is required by the deed of gift. Sailing Anarchy ran a whole piece based on that earlier this year.

It's obvious nonsense, primarily based on a lack of understanding of UK company law, but don't believe for 1 second that every avenue will not be explored if the other potential challengers don't like what ETNZ and INEOS cook up.... If they choose to do something that the others can't stomach they had better be absolutely sure that all of their ducks are standing on parade in a very straight line.

 

[bedouin]

Yes, that was the lever that they used that time around.

Who's to say what it might be this time around?

Oh, and BTW, people ARE saying RYS is a made up yacht club, some American commentators anyway. Not the RYS itself, obviously, but because the RYS actually created an offshoot "Royal Yacht Squadron Racing" as a limited company in order to challenge for the cup whilst protecting the squadron from any potential financial fall out, and therefore they argue that "Royal Yacht Squadron Racing" does not run an annual regatta as is required by the deed of gift. Sailing Anarchy ran a whole piece based on that earlier this year.

It's obvious nonsense, primarily based on a lack of understanding of UK company law, but don't believe for 1 second that every avenue will not be explored if the other potential challengers don't like what ETNZ and INEOS cook up.... If they choose to do something that the others can't stomach they had better be absolutely sure that all of their ducks are standing on parade in a very straight line.

Of course we don't even know if the 1-1 is really going to go ahead.

But by presenting it as a 2 competition series they take a lot of the heat out of it. It is not really feasible to consider another challenger series before 2024 so no one really loses out if they slip in a 1-1 in between.

No one wants another DoG race - a total dead end

 

[dom]

It's obvious nonsense, primarily based on a lack of understanding of UK company law, but don't believe for 1 second that every avenue will not be explored if the other potential challengers don't like what ETNZ and INEOS cook up....

What exactly is the misunderstanding?

 

[flaming]

Of course we don't even know if the 1-1 is really going to go ahead.

But by presenting it as a 2 competition series they take a lot of the heat out of it. It is not really feasible to consider another challenger series before 2024 so no one really loses out if they slip in a 1-1 in between.

No one wants another DoG race - a total dead end

I agree that presenting it as such is exactly the message ETNZ and Ineos want to give, but....

The issue is that as much as the 2 clubs might want to promote it as a 2 competition deal, there's no way that they can legally guarantee that. There is, legally speaking, nothing to stop the winner of the 1V1 to decide to choose a completely different CoR and change the boats back to catamarans and push the event back to 2026 for example. You can write all the caveats into the rules for the 37th cup you like, but there isn't actually a way to bind the winner of that cup, legally, to sticking to an agreement made for a different cup. The deed seems very clear on that.

All of which means that anyone else interested in the cup for 2024 has an interesting dilemma, pump money in now developing an AC75 in the hope that everything goes to plan and such an event happens, or sit on your hands until the 1v1 is decided and the rules for the next cup are published.
If you go for option 1 and ETNZ and Ineos have a massive bust up - a bit like LRR this time round - and the winner throws their toys out of the pram you've wasted millions of pounds and a lot of energy building a boat that will never sail in a cup.
If you go for option 2 and all is still roses after the 1v1, you're a long way behind in the development game.

Contrast to a normal cycle where you'd expect the broad outline of the rules in the next 3 months and could start work with some certainty that what you were doing was useful and relevant.

What ETNZ and Ineos are really asking the others to do is put an extremely high level of trust in them that they will stick to their word, and that there will be a cup, in 2024, in AC75s.

Trust is not really a word that is often associated with the America's cup.

 

[flaming]

What exactly is the misunderstanding?

The chap who wrote the article didn't seem to understand the concept of a holding company, and how that applied to the question of if it was the RYS which was entering the cup.

 

[Kukri]

I’m assuming that the RNZYS as Holder and the RYS as CoR for the 37th can include a term in their agreement - and have indeed already done so - that commits them each to holding the 38th on the terms outlined, regardless of who wins, and that requires any additional entrant to the 37th to adhere to the same terms - and that this agreement has the nature of a valid contract, ie offer and acceptance, valid consideration, and so forth.

 

[bedouin]

I agree that presenting it as such is exactly the message ETNZ and Ineos want to give, but....

The issue is that as much as the 2 clubs might want to promote it as a 2 competition deal, there's no way that they can legally guarantee that. There is, legally speaking, nothing to stop the winner of the 1V1 to decide to choose a completely different CoR and change the boats back to catamarans and push the event back to 2026 for example. You can write all the caveats into the rules for the 37th cup you like, but there isn't actually a way to bind the winner of that cup, legally, to sticking to an agreement made for a different cup. The deed seems very clear on that.

All of which means that anyone else interested in the cup for 2024 has an interesting dilemma, pump money in now developing an AC75 in the hope that everything goes to plan and such an event happens, or sit on your hands until the 1v1 is decided and the rules for the next cup are published.
If you go for option 1 and ETNZ and Ineos have a massive bust up - a bit like LRR this time round - and the winner throws their toys out of the pram you've wasted millions of pounds and a lot of energy building a boat that will never sail in a cup.
If you go for option 2 and all is still roses after the 1v1, you're a long way behind in the development game.

Contrast to a normal cycle where you'd expect the broad outline of the rules in the next 3 months and could start work with some certainty that what you were doing was useful and relevant.

What ETNZ and Ineos are really asking the others to do is put an extremely high level of trust in them that they will stick to their word, and that there will be a cup, in 2024, in AC75s.

Trust is not really a word that is often associated with the America's cup.

That is always the way - the Deed of Gift is about 1 on 1 races. Once the defender has accepted the Cor the ability for anyone else to compete is only by agreement with defender and CoR. The whole idea of a separate competition to decide who actually faces the defender is a recent innovation and arguably doesn't satisfy the deed of gift.

The INEOS challenge has been accepted so no one else has any say except by agreement with defender and CoR.

 

[flaming]

I’m assuming that the RNZYS as Holder and the RYS as CoR for the 37th can include a term in their agreement - and have indeed already done so - that commits them each to holding the 38th on the terms outlined, regardless of who wins, and that requires any additional entrant to the 37th to adhere to the same terms - and that this agreement has the nature of a valid contract, ie offer and acceptance, valid consideration, and so forth.

That's what they've done. But the reality is that I don't think that this would hold any weight if they decided to rip it up after winning the 37th cup.

Put it this way, suppose that they completely fall out to the extent that there is no way that they'd agree to act as each other's CoR for the 38th cup. And so whoever wins accepts a challenge and that challenger becomes the CoR. Why does that CoR get no say in the details of the cup they are the CoR for?
And what happens if having challenged, that challenger decides they cannot agree and instigates a DOG match? Surely they cannot be held to the agreement for the 37th cup, they weren't in it.

Worth saying that I cannot think of the last time that a challenger lost the cup and then stayed on as the CoR for the next cup, let alone a defender. So that in itself would be unusual.

 

[flaming]

The INEOS challenge has been accepted so no one else has any say except by agreement with defender and CoR.

For the next cup, and the next cup only. That's the difference.

 

[dom]

The chap who wrote the article didn't seem to understand the concept of a holding company, and how that applied to the question of if it was the RYS which was entering the cup.

In practice SPVs (special purpose vehicles), NewCos, etc, are part of the landscape of such risk mitigation and asset sharing arrangements and probably a bit of a red herring here. If legal challenges do follow, they will more likely be something very technical and ultra-tactical.

It must also be factored in that LR received terrible publicity in NZ and beyond by being seen to legal-eagle a pandemic dampened event. The sponsors will want to put a stop to that PDQ, especially as heightened media exposure means that the series is almost worth it commercially. That would be a first, with the balance possibly finally tipped by the latest attempts to limit costs.

My prediction is that the Cup will start to resemble F1 with a new commercial look few even envisage today.

In fact, the process has started

 

[flaming]

My prediction is that the Cup will start to resemble F1 with a new commercial look few even envisage today.

In fact, the process has started

I agree, but worth remembering that we've been there before... 5 out of the 6 teams in Bermuda signed up to the "London Protocol" which would have meant that they agreed to hold the cup every 2nd year, in the cats with supporting series. This was very much to take the cup away from the challenge model and make it closer to F1. ETNZ disagreed, and then won the cup so it didn't happen. I think there are probably very few people who think we really missed out after seeing the AC75s in action.
Although what we do now have is SailGP, founded by Larry Ellison when his cup dream died, which is closer to indycar, and very watchable. Fleet racing suits those cats so much better than match racing.

Every time people start talking about the cup being "the F1 of the sea" something happens to shove it back into a challenger series.

 

[Kukri]

In practice SPVs (special purpose vehicles), NewCos, etc, are part of the landscape of such risk mitigation and asset sharing arrangements and probably a bit of a red herring here. If legal challenges do follow, they will more likely be something very technical and ultra-tactical.

It must also be factored in that LR received terrible publicity in NZ and beyond by being seen to legal-eagle a pandemic dampened event. The sponsors will want to put a stop to that PDQ, especially as heightened media exposure means that the series is almost worth it commercially. That would be a first, with the balance possibly finally tipped by the latest attempts to limit costs.

My prediction is that the Cup will start to resemble F1 with a new commercial look few even envisage today.

In fact, the process has started

I agree with all that. And with Flaming’s observations.

I think I have seen Jim Ratcliffe quoted as saying that he thinks the America’s Cup should be more like F1 (?)

If we think about it, when “Sceptre, RYS” was challenging for the Cup, Vanwall cars were winning F1 painted plain green and only the cognoscenti would have understood that this was really all about thin wall bearings.*

However, we don’t have to have massed start fleet racing to turn the Cup into “something more like F1.” We’ve seen that match racing can make good television, and it’s the good television that matters.

* if indeed it was intended as marketing at all. Folklore has it that Tony Vandervell only set up Vanwall because Enzo Ferrari had annoyed him by ripping him off - Vanwall bought a racing car from Ferrari and it arrived with nothing hardened - it was a “fake” racing car - which Enzo thought he could get away with because some English amateur whom he had never met would not actually take it racing!

In the words of the heroine in the film “Pretty Woman”, to the shop girls who had refused to serve her, “Mistake! Big mistake!”

There was some anti-advertising in the Vanwall - Rolls-Royce designed and made the crankshaft and crankcase (the top end was four Norton 500cc singles in line) on condition that their name was never mentioned, as they “didn’t do racing”.?

 

[dom]

I agree with all that. And with Flaming’s observations.

I think I have seen Jim Ratcliffe quoted as saying that he thinks the America’s Cup should be more like F1 (?)

If we think about it, when “Sceptre, RYS” was challenging for the Cup, Vanwall cars were winning F1 painted plain green and only the cognoscenti would have understood that this was really all about thin wall bearings.

However, we don’t have to have massed start fleet racing to turn the Cup into “something more like F1.” We’ve seen that match racing can make good television, and it’s the good television that matters.

I agree with you and on reflection F1 was a bad analogy on my part. I'm not suggesting that we'll necessarily see multiple vessels all whizzing around, rather that the imminent commercial breakeven tipping point of the Cup will radically change it.

That's why, for example, I would hazard a guess that LR will desist from doubling down on its losing PR bets -- if it's just an ego game nobody would give a toss, but the team's bad PR will only exacerbate LR's loss on the water. It's a curious asymmetry:

Had LR won, it would have argued that aggressive tactics is a "winner's weapon" and that's fine for a brand which had just wrested control of the immediate evolution of the event.

As it turned out LR suffered a 3-Way humiliation: (i) lost on the water, (ii) the team's grimy PR was exacerbated by losing to TNZ (the "good guys"), and (iii) LR now looks like Billy no-mates left out in the cold.

LR will be back for sure, just a bit differently in a world where egos play second fiddle to wallets!

 

[dom]

If we think about it, when “Sceptre, RYS” was challenging for the Cup, Vanwall cars were winning F1 painted plain green and only the cognoscenti would have understood that this was really all about thin wall bearings.*

However, we don’t have to have massed start fleet racing to turn the Cup into “something more like F1.” We’ve seen that match racing can make good television, and it’s the good television that matters.

* if indeed it was intended as marketing at all. Folklore has it that Tony Vandervell only set up Vanwall because Enzo Ferrari had annoyed him by ripping him off - Vanwall bought a racing car from Ferrari and it arrived with nothing hardened - it was a “fake” racing car - which Enzo thought he could get away with because some English amateur whom he had never met would not actually take it racing!

In the words of the heroine in the film “Pretty Woman”, to the shop girls who had refused to serve her, “Mistake! Big mistake!”

There was some anti-advertising in the Vanwall - Rolls-Royce designed and made the crankshaft and crankcase (the top end was four Norton 500cc singles in line) on condition that their name was never mentioned, as they “didn’t do racing”.?

Great post and possibly prescient!

 

[Kukri]

I agree with you and on reflection F1 was a bad analogy on my part. I'm not suggesting that we'll necessarily see multiple vessels all whizzing around, rather that the imminent commercial breakeven tipping point of the Cup will radically change it.

That's why, for example, I would hazard a guess that LR will desist from doubling down on its losing PR bets -- if it's just an ego game nobody would give a toss, but the team's bad PR will only exacerbate LR's loss on the water. It's a curious asymmetry:

Had LR won, it would have argued that aggressive tactics is a "winner's weapon" and that's fine for a brand which had just wrested control of the immediate evolution of the event.

As it turned out LR suffered a 3-Way humiliation: (i) lost on the water, (ii) the team's grimy PR was exacerbated by losing to TNZ (the "good guys"), and (iii) LR now looks like Billy no-mates left out in the cold.

LR will be back for sure, just a bit differently in a world where egos play second fiddle to wallets!

Completely agree. (Time to shut down this mutual admiration society - but Flaming can join if he likes!?).