New Zealand has finished second in the latest round of SailGP in Saint-Tropez, France.
NZ SailGP team Photo: PHOTOSPORT
It was another encouraging result for Peter Burling's crew after winning the last two rounds in Plymouth and Copenhagen.
The United States, skippered by Jimmy Spithill, secured its first ever event victory to get its Season 3 Championship campaign back on track.
On an incredibly light-wind day which drastically constasted the crazy conditions of Race Day 1, the U.S. defeated New Zealand and Great Britain in the three-team winner-takes-all Final.
Due to the lack of breeze on the Gulf of Saint-Tropez there were major changes to the race schedule, with the fifth Fleet Race terminated - due to no one crossing the finish line inside the 14-minute race window - and the sixth Fleet Race - added from this event onwards to introduce SailGP 'Super Sundays' - cancelled entirely.
As a result, the United States won the only completed Fleet Race of the day, before claiming the all-important victory in the Final.
However, an incident with France during racing saw the U.S. penalised four points from their season total, meaning they failed to climb the Championship rankings and remain in seventh place after five events.
Reigning champions Australia - who finished fifth in Saint-Tropez - remain atop the season leaderboard with 42 points, although only one point now separates them from New Zealand in second following the Kiwis' rapid climb up the table.
The Kiwis' fellow beaten finalists in France, Great Britain, are a further seven points back in third, with Denmark (33 points), France (31 points) and Canada (29 points) making up a congested midfield.
The US have 25 points to sit seventh, while Spain and Switzerland prop up the rest of the table on 15 and 12 points respectively.
The racing action resumes in under two weeks with the Spain Sail Grand Prix taking place on 24-25 September.
In the final New Zealand copped a penalty at the start but fought back to take second.
Driver Peter Burling said, "It was definitely not good to get OCS (on course side) - everyone knows how important it is in those finals to lead at mark one. We spent a lot of time trying to get rid of the penalty after that, which was a little bit frustrating."
But Strategist Jo Aleh said in conditions like today, slowing down wasn't always an option.
"We were pretty patient but maybe not quite patient enough. Once you start, that's it. Once you're going at that pace if we'd slowed it, it would have been no good. So, you win some you lose some on that - you've just got to commit," Aleh said.
Reflecting on the weekend, Burling said, "As a group we're really proud … We're really happy with the way we sailed yesterday, getting a couple of wins on the board. Pretty happy with the way we sailed the first race today. That second one got abandoned - it wasn't our finest hour but we were happy with the way we performed in the final."