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Burling: Team New Zealand Have Faster Boat

Peter Burling is in a buoyant mood ahead of the America’s Cup, confident that Team New Zealand have ‘the faster boat’.

The Kiwi syndicate are often known to play their chances down, not wanting to give too much away to the competition.

But Burling was in a confident mood when asked about the potential speed advantage that Te Rehutai is expected to have over Luna Rossa.

When asked by an Italian journalist whether Burling thought Team New Zealand had the faster boat, he gave a forthright answer.

“I definitely hope so,” he laughed.

“You know, I definitely think there are a lot of conditions where I am relatively confident, we do have a faster boat.

“There’s obviously a lot of conditions where Luna Rossa has proved to be very strong, you know, especially against some of the other challengers but a lot of those have been areas that we’ve been making some pretty big strides forward in the last few months. It’s been a pretty good period of development for us as a team [and] we’re really excited about getting into this first race [on Wednesday].”

Burling doesn’t believe that performance in the light air is a weakness any longer, feeling they have made significant progress over the last three months.

“I think we’ve made pretty big gains across the board, but probably especially in the lighter airs,” said Burling. “The light air was probably our most perceived weakness in the Christmas Cup but now it’s been something that we really feel like we’ve made some pretty massive steps forward in that area. We’re pretty happy with our performance in that area now.”

/Stewart
Sports news editor