YOUNG AMERICA SKIPPER ED BAIRD
PLACES 3rd IN DENMARK'S COTTONFIELD CUP

SOUTH PORTLAND, ME - Ed Baird and Team Young America finished third overall yesterday in Denmark's Cottonfield Cup. France's Bertrand Pace defeated New Zealand's Russell Coutts 3-1 in the final to win the match racing event with Coutts taking second.

Team Young America includes skipper Baird, the top-ranked U.S. match racer; Tony Rey, tactician; Jamie Gale, pit; Geordie Shaver, foredeck; and Jon Gundersen, trimmer.

In a light air series, Team Young America earned an 8-2 record after 10 flights in the round robins. The light conditions forced race organizers to eliminate the semi-final round and move to the finals. Points leaders Pace and Coutts, both with a 9-1 record, advanced to the best-of-five finals. In a sail-off for third place, Team Young America defeated Denmark's Morten Henriksen 2-0.

In the second round robin, Team Young America had only one loss when meeting Coutts for the first time in the regatta. In an exciting race, Baird had Coutts off the starting line. Team Young America was in the lead when Coutts, who incurred a penalty at the start, got ahead in a shift near the mark. At the second windward mark, Coutts rounded a length ahead, but still owed a penalty. Coutts got the last of a dying puff off the shore, took his penalty turn and
finished ahead of Team Young America, earning a berth in the finals.

For Team Young America, this was the first regatta on the world match racing circuit since last November and the first of seven world match events on their schedule for the remainder of the year, including the world championships in Sweden in July.

"It was good to get into the boats that the Worlds will be in this July," Baird said. "We learned several things, and we're starting to get a handle on the new rules. It's been almost eight months since we've been at a circuit match race. While we're disappointed that we didn't make the final, we only lost two matches in very tricky conditions so we felt satisfied that we had a good performance overall."

Eight of the world's top ten match racers are among the 12 skippers who competed in the Grade One event sailed in 37-foot DS Match Racers in Skovshoved Harbour. The regatta lineup included these top-ranked skippers: 1995 America's Cup winner Russell Coutts (1), France's Bertrand Pace (3), Baird (4), England's Chris Law (6), Denmark's Morten Henriksen (7) and Jesper Bank (8), Sweden's Magnus Holmberg (9), and Switzerland's Jochen Schumann
(10).

Team Young America competes this week in the Maxi Regatta of the 143rd Annual NYYC Regatta with Falcon2000. The match racing crew then goes to Italy for the Trofeo Challenge June 23-29 and to Sweden for the World Championship of Match Race sailing July 1-6.