The usual excitement of Skandia Cowes Week has been given an extra boost, courtesy of the iShares Cup. This series of event, which started in Lugano, Switzerland, sees Extreme 40 catamarans being guided at high speeds round a race course. Capsizes, cartwheels and collisions are all par for the course and it’s quite a spectacle.

Among those crews are representatives to the two chief protagonists in the on-going America’s Cup dispute, BMW Oracle and Alinghi. The former has two boats racing, with Australian America’s Cupper James Spithill and French multihull superstar Franck Cammas at the helms and double America’s Cup winner Russell Coutts managing the team. Ed Baird is helming for Alinghi. Also racing is Team Origin, the British America’s Cup team, and a BT boat with Nick Moloney on the tillers.

Halfway through the contest Ed Baird is making the running but with capsize just a whisker away, there’s plenty yet to play for.