The America’s Cup World Series is a single series, with all races counted together. Each event schedules only two days of fleet racing, on a single weekend, with no provision for days lost because of too little or two much wind.

Fleet racing?  In one design boats?

The America’s Cup is a match racing event. All the racing in Bermuda in May and June 2017, when the teams race their “America’s Cup Class” yachts, will be match racing – one on one. Each team designs their own foils, rudders and control systems for their America’s Cup Class yacht, and this design contest is a major part of the America’s Cup.

The America’s Cup World Series is fleet racing only, sailed in identical, one design AC45F catamarans, all of them built in New Zealand by a company owned by Oracle Racing, “Core Builders.”

Curious scoring in the America’s Cup World Series

Curiously, with the double points awarded for Sunday races, coming in last on Sunday scores the same number of points as coming in first on Saturday. At the end of the series, the winner of the series and the second place team carry bonus points into the round robin (match racing) “America’s Cup Qualifiers” – two bonus points for the winner, one for the runner up. And, the ACWS standings will be used to break ties at the end of the round robin. Read more.

America’s Cup Qualifiers (round robin)

In a break with tradition, defender Oracle races with the challengers in the round robin “America’s Cup Qualifiers.”  At the end of the round robin, the winning team earns a bonus point for the America’s Cup Match. Curiously, the “bonus point” means that the other team in the Match starts with a score of minus one point. Read more. Also at the end of the AC Qualifiers, one challenger is eliminated and the four remaining teams go on to the semi-finals and finals of the “America’s Cup Challenger Playoffs.” All this shows the surprising importance of the one design fleet races in the America’s Cup World Series: both the bonus point for the America’s Cup Match and the challenger to be eliminated could be decided on tie breaks using the ACWS standings.

A curious scenario

Imagine that  Team XYZ focuses on designing and developing their America’s Cup Class yacht and on training in Bermuda, rather than on the one design fleet racing in other venues in the ACWS.  They start the AC Qualifiers with no bonus points, but go undefeated, winning by large margins in all 10 of their round robin matches. Assume that Team ABC won the ACWS and started the round robin with two bonus points. Team ABC wins all but two of their round robin races – the two in which they were trounced by Team XYZ. So Team XYZ has 10 points – one for each match race they won in the double round robin. Team ABC also has 10 points – one for each of the eight races they won in the round robin plus two bonus points from winning the ACWS. The tie is broken by the ACWS standings, so Team ABC is declared the winner of the AC Qualifiers and has the bonus point for the America’s Cup Match. Even though Team XYZ was clearly dominant when match racing America’s Cup Class yachts in Bermuda, it is the team that excelled in one design fleet races in other venues which can start the America’s Match with a one point lead. Curious, but it could happen.