Coffee, Losing Prove to Be Bitter to Sweden : Sailing: All kidding aside, syndicate's poor performance has reduced the party attitude.

By KIM Q. BERKSHIRE

Feb. 22, 1992 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

SAN DIEGO — Come visit. Ask questions. Take snapshots.

Maybe even buy a crew member a cup of coffee. Uh, better make that tea. American coffee is one of the few things the Swedish find offensive about the United States.

“It’s absolutely horrible,” said Borg Goran, project manager for Sweden’s America’s Cup syndicate. “It’s the only thing about this country I don’t like.”

How about being 1-10 after 11 races in the Louis Vuitton Cup?

“It’s frustrating to be losing,” acknowledged crewman Bjorn Ericson. “We are competitors. We’re here to win. No one’s laughing on the yacht when we’re out there.”

Certainly, no Swede will be laughing today, when the team, seventh out of eight in the challenger standings, takes on Challenge Australia. Sweden is sharing its doormat status with Syd Fischer’s group (0-11). In fact, Fischer on Friday called his syndicate’s boat a dog.

Sweden’s lone victory came in Round 1 against Challenge Australia, which had withdrawn its boat from the final three races of the round for modifications. Today, Tre Kronor sails against the Aussies for a chance to snag its first legitimate victory.

Such a triumph would take the bitterness out of even American coffee.

At the very least, a little success for the Swedes would enhance what has become a love-love relationship with its host country. And the feeling is mutual.

San Diegans and visitors to the city needn’t go farther than the Hyatt Islandia, Sweden’s Cup headquarters, to get up-close with an International America’s Cup Class yacht and personal with the personnel.

Most challengers and defenders run their syndicates like some secret brotherhood of yachting.

Not the Swedes. Representatives of the West Coast-based Stenungsbaden Yacht Club have taken their open-door policy to the extreme. What we have here is a bona fide revolving door.

“Personally, I think (the openness) has gone too far,” said crewman Bjorn Ericson, who has been with the project since 1986. “We are so open. Everyone has secrets. You don’t have to tell everyone everything.”

Yet Ericson, who left wife Britta, and three young children at home and who quit a well-paying job at a chic Stockholm restaurant to pursue this sailing dream, wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I like the open compound,” he said. “I get more out of it. I like the interaction with people. Otherwise, it’s like you’re on a treadmill. What’s the fun of that?’

Swedish spokesman Lars Sjogrell says a public that has grown accustomed to the typical surreptitious operations of the Cup is befuddled--and delighted--by Sweden’s goodwill.

“They stand outside our gate and when we tell them they can come in and take pictures, they can’t believe it,” he said. “Usually, about the time the boat comes in, we get a small gathering.”

Unlike other camps, where onlookers must gaze from afar, Swedish crew members informally and frequently interact with the public.

“There are no silly questions, only dumb answers,” said Ericson. “You have to open it up to them since they can’t be out there on the water.”

To understand Sweden’s open-door policy, you must understand something about Sweden.

“We were not involved in World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, or the Persian Gulf War,” Goran said. “That is why we have such an open society. Perhaps we are a little spoiled, a bit naive in wanting a society this way.”

There is talk that some other syndicates run such cloak-and-dagger operations that crew members aren’t even allowed to see the keel of the boat they’re helping to race.

“How can you trust someone to be on you’re crew if you don’t even trust them to see the keel?” Ericson wonders.

Ericson said it’s important to open camp to the public, because you can’t expect fans or sponsors to rally behind something that’s intangible.

“This is sailing,” he said. “This isn’t ice hockey. People don’t know what it’s all about. So you have to make it human. You have to give them something. Otherwise you aren’t going to get any support.”

But all this harmonic interaction, combined with the prevailing notion that the Swedes are a good-time waiting to happen, has them a bit misunderstood.

“Having fun isn’t the same as being up late, drinking and dancing,” Ericson said. “Having fun isn’t having a party. We’re having fun because being here is the most fun we can think of in this sport.”

But the predicament of the Swedes, they insist, is more a result of circumstances--they arrived with less money and fewer boats than most, and later than everyone--than lifestyle.

“Compared to how much time we’ve had, we’re not that far behind,” Ericson said.

Goran stretched the point. He said that a syndicate with a wallet as fat as Italy’s should be light years ahead of a syndicate such as Sweden.

“We have a budget of $6 million, they have spent $60 million and they were two minutes ahead,” Goran said. “Sixty million and only two minutes?

Actually, Il Moro di Venezia was 3 minutes 50 seconds faster in the first round and 13:32 in the second. But besides the setback against the Italians, Tre Kronor has improved its times from the first round in every other race of the second series.

Against Espana ’92 Tuesday, Tre Kronor led at the first mark by 53 seconds, but ran into a clump of kelp that slowed them down. A broken spinnaker pole eventually forced them out of the race.

“I’m sure we scared the Spanish,” Ericson said, who described the atmosphere on the board as dismal after the loss to Espana ’92. “We are so much better than before. That’s what we have to concern ourselves with now. We have to keep improving.

Hyatt employees said the Swedes are more relaxed, less “live and die,” than some of the other crews that frequent the hotel.

“Like the French, all they do is talk racing,” said one restaurant employee. “And the Japanese, they are here to win. You don’t even see them out.”

But the Swedish do care, they are frustrated and they desperately want a victory.

“It was frustrating to come so late,” Ericson said. “We were ready in September, but the money was a problem. It’s like we have one arm tied behind our backs.”

Ericson said he hopes the crew will use its losses and setbacks as a motivating factor.

“Hungry wolves hunt best,” he said.