The Emirates Team New Zealand has done it again: it has once again lifted the Auld Mug as winner of the America's Cup. This time, however, it has done so with a particularity: it has achieved it for the third consecutive time, something no team had managed in the world's oldest competition. It has also done so in the first edition held in Barcelona. Now it remains to be seen if it has been the first but not the last in the Catalan capital.
And the so-called Kiwis already have their sights set on the next edition of the regatta. As defenders of the trophy, they will again be the ones to organize the event, as they have already done in this Barcelona edition and the previous one, then in Auckland, New Zealand. Eyes and ears are now on Grant Dalton, CEO of the team and the event organization.
"In 2021, when everyone was returning at dawn after celebrating the title, I was still in my office sending emails, because the day after is the hardest day of the America's Cup. You have to keep working for the next one," Dalton assured. However, he stressed that the location of the next edition will be revealed "in due course." Before that, the team that will be the first challenger to the new title defender will be known. After disputing the final with the Kiwis with a result of 7-2, Ineos Britannia has many chances to act as Challenger of Record.
However, the focus for the winners is not yet on the next edition, but on celebrating the victory. The New Zealanders have lifted the trophy at the Moll de la Fusta, in a race village full of fans and also authorities, including the mayor, Jaume Collboni; the councilor and former municipal manager Albert Dalmau and the president of the Port de Barcelona, Lluís Salvadó. "Barcelona is very proud to have hosted the competition and to have left its legacy, with the celebration for the first time of a women's competition," Collboni claimed.
The New Zealanders have received the victory "incredibly proud of what has been achieved," as celebrated by the skipper of Emirates Team New Zealand, Peter Burling. And the America's Cup is one of the most complex sports competitions in the world: "You have to put many pieces together for everything to work, and now that we have achieved it three times in a row, it is incredibly special."
Aboard their Tahioro, the New Zealanders have prevailed over the British in the ninth and final race by 37 seconds. They did so on a day that began with the largest patín de vela gathering to date, which dyed the sea with the white of their sails.
After the victory, multiple spectator and fan boats that had followed the race approached the winners, who unfurled a New Zealand flag and a large banner with a message addressed to the city that hosted the competition: Moltes gràcies, Barcelona.