Ever since the schooner America turned this thing into the Americas Cup it's been about showing up with something your design team thought of that the other guy's didn't. The only time people get weepy about it and starting talking about a "match" is when they find out they missed the mark. Yacht America was sufficiently different in its day. We've had long overhangs, winged keels, twisting rigs, odd shaped underhull appendages that aren't really part of the hull, etc, etc, etc. If people really wanted a pure match race to determine the best sailors it would gone pure OD along time ago. But it's not what is truly the essence of the Cup.

There have been lopsided, no tactics, horizon fest, speed decided races in the monos. For the mono crowd to blame this solely on the multis is living in denial.

I think A5 lost their one opportunity in race 2 by letting BMWO go at the crossing. I also wonder if they misjudged where the layline was. Initially it didn't look like BMWO was on the line, but it looked a shift and there they were - they just seemed to read the conditions better. But if A5 had adjusted a little they maybe could have forced a situation to their benefit. Armchair sailing on my part for sure...

Comments made by the designer from A5 during the A5 post race 1 conference made me start to think that they thought they had it all figured out based on their Lake Geneva experience. I think they failed to do their design homework. The boat is beautiful, but some things were just off enough. After seeing different elements of the undercarriage bits striking waves I think I know where the call for restrictions on wave states came from. Where did they think they would be sailing?

No pity for them being a small landlocked nation, they played that getting into the AC in the first place, and it worked through two ACs.

I was impressed with the sportsmanship of BMWO. I was initially impressed with the A5 sportsmanship, a few points off in the end for blaming biased court decisions.

For the most part I enjoyed the SA coverage, but I also liked the coverage on ESPN360 with Jobson and Smyth. I've not been the biggest fan of Jobson for his take on multihulls, but this was a good combo. In the end he said he needed to get to West River to try an A-Cat! We shall invite him and await his visit... The SA commentary was great, but degenerated around the last mark rounding (recordings of how EB had no "secret weapon"), but hey, that's SA.

I'm not sure I can get too excited about an AC that turns back the techno clock (I want one of Spithill's backpacks with head up display sunglasses!), but hey, it will be sailing, so I'll probably watch anyway, and grumble about how the monos have destroyed the cup...

I hope that BMWO gets donated to the new Sailing Hall of Fame in Annapolis and they give folks rides for a fee. I'll spend many weekends getting back in line.

In the end, cheers to both teams for bringing what they had and laying it on the line. Cheers to the folks that presented it us on the interweb - it was disappointing that it wasn't on TV, but honestly, in the end, the coverage was far better this way than it could have been on TV. The only thing missing was onboard cameras (why ban that EB?).