INEOS Britannia are just one win away from winning the Louis Vuitton Cup and progressing to the America's Cup final to face Team New Zealand.
Two strong performances on day six of the Louis Vuitton Cup by the British team helped push them out to a 6-4 lead over Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli in the first-to-seven race series.
In race one Luna Rossa briefly lost their rudder immersion which caused the hull to touch the water and by the time they were back up, Britannia had gained a lengthy advantage. The Brits held off a strong Luna Rossa fightback to take the first race of the day by 23 seconds and make it 5-4 in the series.
INEOS Britannia took a narrow early lead in the second race of the day, and fought through some tricky conditions in the Barcelona harbour to win the race and lead the series 6-4.
Racing continues on Saturday morning (NZT) with the Brits needing just one win from the two races to progress as the challenger for the final of the America's Cup.
Francesco Bruni, port helm for Luna Rossa, said he was still positive about the situation.
"We know very well the position. It's not something that we like but sport is sport, and you have to accept when you lose. Today we lost in the field, no breakdowns, nothing, we just didn't execute well a couple of things and then also didn't sail very well."
Luna Rossa recovered from a nosedive yesterday to come back and win race two but couldn't get any joy out of day six of racing.
"It was very close racing, really tough conditions but for me we still have a good chance of doing it and we definitely are not feeling the pressure. We know that we can do it and that we have to just sail the best we can now," Bruni said.
"There's going to be some pressure there yes, but I don't feel the pressure probably because I have Jimmy (Spithill) on my side and honestly, I'm super relaxed. We haven't made huge mistakes today, just small things here and there and we lost two points, but that's not the end of the world. We know that we can win."
Port helm on INEOS Britannia Dylan Fletcher was pleased with his team's performance but said they weren't getting ahead of themselves.
"We will debrief like always and for us it's just one race at a time. We know we've got to win every race in reality until the first to seven so we're happy and looking forward to Friday," Fletcher said.
"It was a fantastic performance by the team today. It's been frustrating with this stalemate each day, and it feels like so many of the races were close to ours, so to break it today and have a nice solid performance against them feels good."
Racing in the Louis Vuitton Cup final continues on Saturday morning (NZT) with two races scheduled.
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