Reuters: Sports News: Powerful Oracle moves a step closer to keeping America's Cup

Reuters: Sports News Reuters.com is your source for breaking news, business, financial and investing news, including personal finance and stocks. Reuters is the leading global provider of news, financial information and technology solutions to the world's media, financial institutions, businesses and individuals. // via fulltextrssfeed.com

Manage your social media Best social media tool for image publishing to Facebook and Twitter. Look amazing and delight your followers. Get 40% off when you sign up today. From our sponsors

Powerful Oracle moves a step closer to keeping America's Cup Sep 24th 2013, 01:07 1 of 15. Oracle Team USA (R) sails ahead of Emirates Team New Zealand during Race 16 of the 34th America's Cup yacht sailing race in San Francisco, California September 23, 2013. Credit: Reuters/Robert Galbraith By Noel Randewich SAN FRANCISCO | Mon Sep 23, 2013 9:07pm EDT SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Oracle Team USA moved a step closer to keeping the America's Cup on Monday, winning the day's only race and yet again preventing challenger Emirates Team New Zealand from clinching the trophy. It was the fifth straight victory for the team owned by billionaire Larry Ellison, which a week ago seemed like it was about to lose the world's oldest sporting trophy but now looks strong enough to win the series - as long as it can keep the Kiwis from winning one more race. New Zealand appeared to have the advantage at the starting gun, crossing the line slightly ahead. But Oracle was quicker to rise up on its foils and accelerate, passing the Kiwis to windward and preventing them from getting a right-of-way blocking position at mark one. New Zealand never recovered, despite hoisting a second, larger jib hoping for more downwind speed, and finished 33 seconds behind the agile U.S. boat. "We were relatively happy with where we were on the line but they managed to get a bit of momentum at the start. A little bit frustrating," said New Zealand skipper Dean Barker. "The Oracle guys had a polished race that time and there were no opportunities to get back into it." Weak wind delayed the start of the race on Monday and not enough time was left for a second scheduled race. Two more races are scheduled for Tuesday. After struggling to keep up with New Zealand in the early matches of the final series, Oracle made changes to its AC72 catamaran and improved its execution of maneuvers. It's newly found competitiveness has set the stage for a historic comeback. New Zealand's point advantage over Oracle has fallen to 8-6 in the best-of-17 series. Oracle now needs to win three straight races to keep the Cup, while New Zealand needs just one to take it home. On the water, Oracle has won eight races, the same as New Zealand, but its first two wins were negated by a cheating penalty before the finals began. Too much wind, too little wind, and wind from the wrong direction have forced organizers to postpone several races since the series began on Sept 7. On Saturday, the Kiwis were well on their way to winning one last match, and the Cup. But with both teams struggling to find enough wind, that race was called off after a time limit was exceeded. (Editing by Alden Bentley) Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

You are receiving this email because you subscribed to this feed at blogtrottr.com. If you no longer wish to receive these emails, you can unsubscribe from this feed, or manage all your subscriptions