Conner’s America’s Cup Bid Ends, For Now

Dennis Conner’s ninth America’s Cup campaign ended when his New York-based team, Stars & Stripes, was eliminated from the 31st Cup regatta by OneWorld of Seattle today at Auckland, New Zealand.

OneWorld beat Team Dennis Conner by one minute to complete a 4-0 sweep of their best-of-seven quarterfinal; OneWorld advanced to the semifinals, which begin Dec. 9.

Prada of Italy -- the challenger champion off Auckland two years ago -- advanced to its second Louis Vuitton Cup semifinal when it beat Sweden’s Victory Challenge by 1:37, also completing a 4-0 series victory.

The success of the Seattle and Italian teams means the most powerful challenger teams, those with billionaire backers, will now line up in the four-team semifinals.

OneWorld, supported by Seattle cell-phone pioneer Craig McCaw and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Prada, backed by the Milan fashion house of the same name, join Alinghi of Switzerland and Oracle of San Francisco in the final four.

Conner has won the Cup four times since 1974, and the New York Yacht Club held the trophy for 132 years.

In the semifinals, Oracle will race Alinghi and OneWorld will take on Prada, but there are legal issues to settle before that is confirmed.

Stars & Stripes and Prada are partners in a legal action that seeks to have OneWorld thrown out of the competition for acquiring secret design information belonging to other teams.

The Cup’s arbitration panel will meet Dec. 7 and 8 to consider that case.

If the panel or jury rule against OneWorld, Conner’s team could be called back into action. Because of that reason, his team won’t leave Auckland anytime soon.

Sweden placed its last, faint hope for Friday’s challenger regatta in the hands of Magnus Holmberg, giving him the helm of its race yacht Orm in place of double Olympic gold medalist Jesper Bank.

Stars & Stripes fought doggedly to keep alive its campaign, trailing OneWorld by no more than 21 seconds over the first five legs.

Stars & Stripes also sailed into trouble at the last mark rounding, when it briefly lost control of its spinnaker.

Golf

Retief Goosen and Chris DiMarco shot four-under-par 68s to share the first-round lead at the $4.06-million Nedbank Golf Challenge at Sun City, South Africa.

Jim Furyk was at 69, with three players at 70: defending champion Sergio Garcia, Robert Allenby and Ernie Els. The winner of the elite 12-player tournament earns $2 million, the richest prize in golf.

The greens were hard and fast at Gary Player Country Club because of little rain this month in this part of South Africa.

Nick Price and Michael Campbell shot 71s, Darren Clarke and Padraig Harrington were at 72, with Bob Estes at 73 and Colin Montgomerie at 74.

Furyk, who was disqualified in last year’s first round for a violation he called on himself, played before enthusiastic galleries.

“A lot of people told me they were glad to have me here, and it sure was nice to have the support of people in Ernie Els’ back yard,” he said.

Winter Sports

Primoz Peterka of Slovenia topped qualifying in the first World Cup ski jumping meet of the season at Kuusamo, Finland.

Jumping under the lights in this Finnish city just south of the Arctic Circle, Peterka recorded a leap of 461 feet on the K120 hill. Austria’s Andreas Widholzl was second at 457 1/2 feet (139.5 meters), and Peterka’s teammate Robert Kranjec was third.

The season opener is scheduled for today, weather permitting.

Cold weather threatened today’s second leg of the Nordic combined World Cup opener, a 15-kilometer cross-country race. Under race rules, the limit is minus-four degrees Fahrenheit.

On Thursday evening, the temperature was zero degrees.