Admiral's Cup issue still rankles

SAILING: The latest information bulletin issued by the Royal Ocean Racing Club (RORC) carries the wish of Commodore Peter Rutter that "he would like to draw a line under this matter" but if anything the storm surrounding the departure of the Admiral's Cup from Dún Laoghaire shows little sign of abating.

There has been a wave of international support for the club and yesterday there were suggestions that the Royal St George Yacht Club (Rst.GYC) should proceed with a similar style event regardless.

In a separate development the Irish Sailing Association (ISA) president John Crebbin - a member of the Dún Laoghaire club - carried the debate to national level by expressing how the Irish authority was baffled by RORC's decision in the light of the positive role played by the Rst.GYC.

The ISA statement led Rutter to express concern that the RORC bombshell "was being interpreted by some as a criticism of Irish sailing".

The London Commodore added: "From both a purely personal stand point and as Commodore of the RORC the individual difficulties of negotiations over the Admiral's Cup in no way affected the high regard of the RORC for the organisation of Irish sailing and the Royal St George Yacht Club."

The debate, however, has moved on and in one of many letters to the email sailing bulletin Scuttlebutt, a UK correspondent, Peter Huston suggests the creation of the Emerald Isle cup: "So what if the RORC has taken their football and gone home. The only thing they have really said to RStGYC is 'you can't run a regatta called the Admiral's Cup'.

Huston appeals to Irish sailing to run the event it had worked so hard to build: "Let's see what the market really wants - stuffy traditionalism, or forward thinking. I'll bet more teams show up in Ireland than in the UK this summer for a two-boat country challenge".

In Auckland, boat speed, tactical advantages and starting ability are cited as some of the key points for the GBR Challenge to overcome when she meets Dennis Conner's Stars and Stripes in the quarter-finals of the Louis Vuitton Cup in Auckland but perhaps the biggest question GBR skipper Ian Walker must answer is what boat to use? The Sydney Olympic silver medallist has admitted he needs to squeeze more speed from boat, mast, foils and sails.

Peter Harrison's team have a week to test their GBR 70 against GBR 78 with her unconventional twin keel - it will be a choice between a boat better understood by rivals against a concept yacht which has already required major surgery.