Four Are Well-Suited to Semifinals

Two Americans and two New Zealanders were in the semifinals of the 26th Congressional Cup sailing regatta at Long Beach Friday.

Does this mean they settled it in the New York Supreme Court?

No way. This time, while their countrymen await the final ruling on the America’s Cup, these Yanks and Kiwis are competing in their saltwater element.

In the first round of the best-of-three semifinals Friday, Robbie Haines of Newport Beach beat Russell Coutts, the round-robin winner, by 20 seconds; and Chris Dickson defeated Peter Isler of San Diego by 24 seconds.

They will complete those series today, then go directly into a best-of-three final on the one-mile, windward-leeward course off the east end of the Long Beach breakwater.

Coutts, 28, finished the round-robin with a 7-2 record, followed by the three others at 6-3. First place entitled Coutts to select his semifinal opponent--who promptly beat hin, convincingly.

Addressing the issue, Coutts said: “I’m wondering why I picked Robbie, too.”

Dickson, 29, said this week, after losing three consecutive races: “I thought the race committee did a great job in equalizing the boats. I wish they could do something to equalize the skippers.”

In truth, there isn’t much difference. In 30 races over the last two days, the largest margin of victory has been 1 minute 6 seconds and the smallest Coutts’ five-second spread over Australia’s Peter Gilmour in the round-robin finale.

Dickson, who has won the last six match-racing events on the world circuit, beat Isler, 35, by guessing right or anticipating a wind shift when they sailed to opposite sides of the course off the starting line.

Haines beat Coutts with a two-second jump at the start that gave him the favored position to leeward. Coutts stayed close until two-thirds of the way to the weather mark, when the wind shifted just far enough right to force Coutts off Haines’ hip and into his disturbed air, driving him back.

Earlier, in a round-robin match against Dickson, Haines had lost by 23 seconds after faltering at the start following some frantic pre-start maneuvering through the spectator fleet, missing boats by inches.

“The spectator boats were too close,” Haines’ tactician, Doug Rastello, said. “I don’t say that as an excuse, but we’re spending more time dodging spectator boats than judging our position.”

Rastello was Rod Davis’ tactician when Davis won the first two of his three Congressional Cups. He is serving Haines well, since Haines, 36, seemed a longshot to reach the final four.

Unlike the three others, Haines is not a regular on the match-racing circuit. The Newport Beach sail maker was a late replacement for Paul Cayard, who withdrew because of his commitment to Italy’s Il Moro America’s Cup syndicate.

Haines, an ’84 Olympic gold medalist, also competed in 1986 but was ill-prepared and placed seventh at 4-5.

“We prepared a lot more for this,” Haines said.