Alinghi Brings the America's Cup Home

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Press Release - Alinghi Brings the America's Cup Home

2007-07-08
Alinghi landed today at Geneva airport amid much national celebration on a day that coincides with the 150th anniversary of the creation of America’s Cup competition. The Swiss team won the Auld Mug for the second consecutive time on the 3 July 2007, successfully defending it against the Challenger, Emirates Team New Zealand, in Valencia by 5 races to 2 in the closest America’s Cup Match ever.

The doors of the Swiss Airlines plane cracked open and syndicate head Ernesto Bertarelli stepped out with the America’s Cup trophy held high, flanking him were team skipper Brad Butterworth, design team coordinator Grant Simmer and the 130-strong team, their triumphant smiles beaming as they descended the steps to celebrate with the Swiss public.

From Geneva airport the sailors travelled to the Société Nautique de Genève (SNG) with the America’s Cup trophy, returning it to the Defending Yacht Club for the second time. The first being in 2003, when Alinghi won sport’s oldest trophy away from New Zealand setting several precedents. It was the first team to win on a first attempt, the first team since the inaugural race in 1851 to return the Cup to Europe and the first challenge from a land-locked country. This time it is the first team to successfully defend the trophy in Europe since the Cup was lost to America in1851.

Famously this “Homecoming” coincides with the 150th anniversary of the creation of the competition. On July 8 1857, George Schulyer, as representative of the former owners of the yacht America, delivered the America’s Cup to the New York Yacht Club with a two page handwritten letter setting out the terms of an international inter-yacht club competition for the silver cup they had spectacularly won almost six years before in Cowes, England. This was the beginning of the competition for the America’s Cup.

From the SNG, the Alinghi team members will travel to nearby Parc des Eaux Vives to celebrate with an anticipated 30-40,000 people at a music festival held in their honour. There will be concerts, TSR live interviews on big screens and team presentations, before the main concert held by an International guest star and finally a spectacular firework display.

This is just the beginning of the Alinghi Homecoming Tour, however. The America’s Cup will continue on to Zurich on the 10 July, then Bern on the 12 July, culminating in Lugano on the 14 July. These three events will be brought to you by UBS, who is sponsoring the tour.

Each one of these homecoming stopovers will include Alinghi photographic projections on famous landmark buildings the night before. These will tell the story of Alinghi and the path to winning the America’s Cup for the second time. Each day the Cup will be on display from 10:00-20:00, team members will be present for autograph signing opportunities from13:00-14:00, 15:00-16:00 and 17:00-18:00 and film footage of the racing will remind public of this historic achievement.

Team syndicate head, Ernesto Bertarelli comments on the tour: “Winning the America’s Cup again is a great achievement and we are doing this “Homecoming Tour” to share our moment of victory with Switzerland as a thank you for the immense support the people have shown us during the campaign.”

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ENDS

Alinghi flies the colours of the Société Nautique de Genève, Switzerland. Its partners for the 2007 campaign are UBS and BT Infonet (Main Partners), as well as Audemars Piguet, SGS, Nespresso, MSC Cruises, WISeKey and North Sails (Co sponsors).

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