The new Italian America's Cup challenger - ITA99 - arrived safe and sound at the Mascalzone Latino-Capitalia Base at 1900 yesterday evening after an adventurous five-day journey from Green Marine in Lymington (UK) last week which saw the ship transporting the boat across the English Channel forced back to England by the tempestuous weather that buffeted Western Europe last week.

Now the yacht is safely in Valencia the team is working round the clock preparing her - including fitting the keel and bulb and stepping the mast - for her first sail in a couple of week's time.

ITA99 is the second of Mascalzone's two new boats built for the 32nd America's Cup, following ITA 90 which the team has been training with since last summer. She is the creation of the Mascalzone Latino-Capitalia Team design group, led by Harry Dunning.

Last night, Duning was among the group of team members that welcomed her arrival commenting: "We are all delighted to greet ITA99. She is the culmination of two years of continuous research and development by our design team and we are very proud of her. I congratulate our boat builders and component suppliers for the beautiful construction job and thank Vincenzo and the sailing and shore teams for all of their valuable input as she moved from concept to reality. We are very eager to see how she performs against ITA90 in the coming weeks as we make preparations for Act 13 and the Louis Vuitton Cup."


Yachting World, 23 January 2007