Cups – beware the whisper

South Africa in a regatta which made a big enough profit to be able to return millions to Team New Zealand, which had lost again in a closer encounter with Alinghi.

Despite the spectacle, there was a tetchy vibe from Alinghi towards many New Zealand media. Valencia was also the first and most spectacular bidder in the new hosting model in which the regatta was bid for by aspiring cities, rather than going to the home port of the victor.

Five years later Valencia was broke and living off federal government welfare.

2013, the next multi-nation cup regatta in San Francisco – the hometown of defender Oracle Team USA – turned out to be everything that Valencia wasn’t, in both good and bad ways.

The enormous AC72 catamaran concept helped deter all but four teams to an event for which the host city proportionately scaled back its investment to “hard-to-find” status. As a member of the New Zealand media, there was at least an absence of hometown arrogance thanks to the challenger’s early, and seemingly unstoppable dominance.

Bermuda in 2017 might have looked glamourous on television but there was a dour, almost hostile tone towards anyone associated with New Zealand.

Defender Oracle Team USA had become the local heroes, first for having brought the event to Bermuda, but also pitching the line that for the cup to stay there, they needed to win.

Other challengers had supported the notion of the island being a longer term venue, making Team New Zealand the baddies who might take it all away.

As they did.

Sweden’s Artemis was the only one which staged the “normal” media open day.

Covid-19 dampened some of the waterfront fervour in Auckland in 2023, but the success of the Team New Zealand-conceived foiling monohull launched a new era for the cup.

That a New Zealand defence will be staged offshore, in Barcelona, is also a new era in this country’s 37-year cup history, and, remember, ignore what people say beforehand – believe what you see as it happens.