Understanding the road to the 32nd America’s Cup

Starting with the Valencia Louis Vuitton Act 4 in June, the 12 teams of the 32nd America’s Cup will begin to earn points that have an impact on who wins the annual Louis Vuitton America’s Cup Class Season Championship and, for the 11 challengers, how many ‘Bonus Points’ they collect ahead of the Louis Vuitton Cup challenger selection series, in 2007.

Each Louis Vuitton Act is regatta with one winner followed in position by 11 other teams (The winning team earns 12 points, and the last team one point).

At the end of the 2005 and 2006 seasons, the team with the most points from the Acts will be declared the Louis Vuitton America’s Cup Class Season Champion.

However, the points earned during the Acts have another purpose for the 11 challengers. At the end of each Act, the influence of the Defender, Team Alinghi, is removed from the results. The challengers are then assigned Louis Vuitton Ranking Points through a high-point system (ie. 1st place gets 11 points, 2nd place gets 10 points, last place gets one point).

The Louis Vuitton Ranking points are also weighted so that the later regattas are worth more. The 2005 Ranking Points are multiplied by one, in 2006 by two, and for the final Louis Vuitton Act 14, the Fleet Race in 2007, the Ranking Points earned are multiplied by three.

The teams are then ranked in order of the number of Louis Vuitton Ranking Points they’ve acquired, and assigned ‘bonus points’. These points are important because they are carried into the two Round Robins of the Louis Vuitton Cup. The first place team earns 4 bonus points, second through fourth gets 3 bonus points, fifth through seventh gets 2 bonus points, and the remaining teams earn one point. Following two Round Robins, (in each Round Robin Challengers sail each other team once), the top four proceed to a Semi Final, with the others eliminated from further competition.