Team New Zealand are in third place heading into the final day of racing at the year's first America's Cup World Series regatta in Oman.
Team New Zealand. Photo: PHOTOSPORT
The New Zealanders recorded a first, fourth and sixth place finish in the three races on day one where light wind conditions prevailed.
Skipper Glenn Ashby was pleased with the start, "We had a great race in the first race, got off the line well and just sailed a good clean race. It certainly wasn't easy, but it never is."
However it was the following two races which proved just how tricky the conditions were for racing amongst the America's Cup fleet.
With breeze holding between six and eight knots boat handling was about flying hulls rather than foiling the AC45's and staying out of trouble.
"The breeze kept things tight," said Ashby. "There was a lot of gas and wind shadows to contend with, unfortunately we got bounced around a bit in the third race, but the teams that kept their nose clean were the ones who came out on top and at the end of the day Land Rover BAR did the best job of it for sure."
The British team won both the second and third races, with the fleet mixing up the finishing order behind them.
Despite the challenges Ashby remained optimistic, "As with all of these world series events, with the Sunday double points races, the regatta basically starts from scratch again tomorrow. So we will take many of the lessons we learned today and be ready to go for tomorrow."
"We are always learning, the whole year is about learning for us and while we conceded about three points overall, the main positive to take from today is we are still on top of the overall leader board, and that's where we want to be by the end of the day tomorrow."
LVACWS OMAN STANDINGS AFTER DAY 1
Land Rover BAR 28
Oracle Team USA 24
Emirates Team New Zealand 22
Softbank Team Japan 21
Artemis Racing 20
Groupama Team France 20
LVACWS OVERALL STANDINGS
Emirates Team New Zealand 144
Land Rover BAR 137
Oracle Team USA 136
Artemis Racing 125
Softbank Team Japan 121
Groupama Team France 102
