SAN DIEGO—No amount of jet lag could keep helmsman James Spithill from smiling about the prospect of getting back onboard one of the world’s fastest sailboats.
Spithill and other sailors with America’s Cup challenger BMW Oracle Racing are waiting for the shore team to finish preparing their modified 90-foot trimaran to they can resume testing on the Pacific Ocean later this week.
“Once you get a taste of this sort of a boat, you just sort of get addicted to it. We’re all pretty keen to get on with it,” Spithill said Tuesday, a day after arriving from a regatta in France.
The monster trimaran, known as BOR 90, hasn’t sailed since March 3. Since then, San Francisco-based BMW Oracle Racing won its last-chance appeal in New York’s highest court and was declared the rightful Challenger of Record.
The Americans will face bitter rival and two-time defending America’s Cup champion Alinghi of Switzerland in a best-of-3 series starting Feb. 8 for the oldest trophy in international sports.
BOR 90 has been hidden away in a temporary boatshed for four months as it was modified…Â Details