last new posting at the golden gate yacht club web site,
november 16
last new posting at ACM,
november 15
silence. public silence. everything seething under the covers and all eyes on the courts of new york pending a ruling due in five minutes or five days or five months and the greatest fear of all, that one party or the other - somebody's going to lose -
might appeal and the question then, per ee cummings . . .
how do you like your blueyed boy
Mr. Death
. . . because that really would be the kiss of.
now with cummings duly honored I'll resume capitalization and observe that silence is a vacuum that will be filled. Thus the avalanche of speculation from certain quarters that Bertarelli has already decided to blow off 2009, or that Ellison will appeal if the court ruling goes against him, or the anticipation (unfulfilled) of seeing an eviction served upon Ellison's BMW Oracle team in their base in Valencia.
The closest thing to news comes in the form of sound bites from Alinghi skipper Brad Butterworth, who talked to Radio New Zealand's Peter Montgomery on a visit Down Under and flatly commented, re. the court case, "Ernesto's going to wait for the outcome."
And to the question of whether Alinghi will appeal, if the court rules that they have an invalid challenger of record, thus moving BMW Oracle Racing into the role: "I don't think so; Ernesto just wants to get on with it. I guess we'd be sailing in catamarans in 2009, but I don't know how you would build one in that time."
Well, at least we'd avoid the expense of all that two-boat testing.
ALSO AT SEA
But literally at sea, we find the doublehanded Barcelona World Race being led through its second scoring gate, in the Canary Islands, by Paprec-Virbac 2 while the rest of the fleet shares a variety of fortunes. Since leaving the Med for the Atlantic, many of the racers have hit patches of light air, including American Jonathan McKee, seen here trimming on Estrella Damm . . .
And here we have Andrew Cape changing headsails aboard Hugo Boss
with a spot of breeze - but "Capey" and Alex Thomson went the long way 'round and added miles to get it—Kimball
