Coutts edges out Gram-Hansen

Dubai: New Zealand sailing great Russell Coutts won the Dubai Match Race Challenge in dramatic fashion yesterday, edging out Denmark's Jes Gram-Hansen after the second leg of the event was cut short by a heavy storm and ended in darkness.

Winds gusting up to 40 knots had threatened to prevent any action at the DIMC. But when racing eventually got under way it was Coutts, only the second foreign skipper ever to win the America's Cup, who came through to defeat Gram-Hansen in an event marking the competitive debut of the RC 44 racing boat.

Trailing 2-1 from Thursday's first leg, Gram-Hansen kept alive his hopes of a first ever match racing victory over the three-times America's Cup-winning helmsman with an opening win after one of the three scheduled races was cancelled.

But the series was then decided when the Dane was halted by a broken jib, leaving Coutts clear to record a 3-2 success and add the Dubai Match Race Challenge to his long list of international honours.

The event was a big success for organisers Dubai International Marine Club and V1 Advanced Composite Technologies, who have built the high performance composite-built RC 44 along with Pauger Carbon from Budapest.

For much of the afternoon, however, with a sand storm blowing in from the desert, it looked increasingly unlikely that any action would be possible.

Surveying the scene from the Dubai International Marine Club breakwater, where a hospitality marquee was being battered by the wind as rain began to call, Coutts said at one point: "We just can't start in this."

Regatta chairman Sid Bensalah, sailing manager at Dubai International Marine Club, said: "The conditions are not extreme, but this is the limit for match racing."

Shortly afterwards the wind began to drop and, with light fading the decision was taken to start the second leg and the two RC 44s made their way from the DIMC marina to the course.

Skippering a crew built around the Italian-based 2007 America's Cup challenger, Mascalzone Latino-Capitalia Team, Gram-Hansen took an early lead in the first race of the second leg and went on to win by five seconds, levelling the series at 2-2.

Then came the showdown, and with darkness descending Gram-Hansen initially got his keel stuck in sand, eventually escaping and hitting the start with an advantage. But Coutts was soon ahead and the broken jib finally ended the Dane's challenge.

The second leg of the Dubai Match Race Challenge had to be cut short because of a heavy storm with winds reaching up to 40 knots.

However, New Zealand's Russell Coutts won the event beating off stiff competition from Denmark's Jes Gram-Hansen.