Sunday, September 26th 2021
USA has to give up America’s Cup
After a historical bankruptcy, you need craftsmen
In the past few years, the America’s Cup winner has changed again and again. That was not always the case at the most traditional sailing competition in the world. For 132 years there has been only one winner from the first event: Team USA. Until 1983. And then, first of all, renovation work is necessary.
When the longest winning streak in sports history was broken after 132 years, the craftsmen first had to move into Midtown Manhattan. Because no member of the feudal New York Yacht Club could have imagined that the “Auld Mug” would ever have to be removed from the showcase in the clubhouse. That is why the 67.5 centimeter high Britannia metal jug was firmly screwed onto a pedestal.
But it was reality: The Australia II of the Royal Perth Yacht Club with skipper John Bertrand wrested one of the most coveted sports trophies in the world from Dennis Conner’s Liberty on September 26, 1983. The challengers sailed 41 seconds ahead of Newport / Rhode Island in the seventh and decisive race, throwing an entire continent into a frenzy of joy.
Because it was also a victory for the uncomplicated “Aussies” against the US sailing establishment. A boxing kangaroo with red gloves fluttered on the mast of the victorious yacht. And the official anthem of Bertrand’s crew wasn’t a shanty song, but the cult song “Down Under” by Men at Work. To date, the Australia II is the main attraction at the Western Australia Maritime Museum in Fremantle.
The new sailing heroes revolutionized the time-honored, but also somewhat dusty, traditional competition with new technology such as the wing keel, which was heavily controversial at the time, and Kevlar-reinforced sails. The unprecedented shame, however, did not let the defeated long-term winners rest, four years later Conner brought the cup back to the USA before Perth. The aura of invincibility, however, was lost forever.