MARK MY WORD: SAILING A CALLING FOR THE IDLE RICH, NOT A SPORT

Sailing, sailing over the ocean blue isn't a sport. It's a calling for the idle rich who don't have to worry any more about pirates or whether the world is flat.

Personally, I find it hard to get excited about the America's Cup, you know the yacht race that seemingly went on forever off the shores of San Diego.

It's hard to get excited about a championship where the winner isn't celebrated with old-fashioned looting and rioting.

For those who don't have their heads in the sails, the black-hulled New Zealand yacht named Black Magic 1 beat Dennis Conner's borrowed boat, Young America, Saturday to win the America's Cup trophy. The Kiwis swept the Americans in five straight races.

This means that the silver trophy will no longer be displayed at the San Diego Yacht Club.

Instead it will take up space at the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron in Auckland, the largest city in the island nation of 3.5 million.

New Zealand is situated near the bottom of the world, where the Earth is in fact flat. This gives New Zealanders a distinct advantage when it comes to smooth sailing.

The America's Cup is meant to be a traveling trophy. But it generally stays in the good old USA, where it can be assured of better room service.

At any rate, Saturday marked only the third time the cup has changed hands since the schooner America wrestled it off a fleet of British yachts in 1851.

This year's America's Cup competition lasted four months. The New Zealanders finished with a 42-1 record, even without Michael Jordan on their team.

Sailing is a lot different than golf, although baggy clothing is preferred in both endeavors.

In sailboat races, you need a couple of things, most importantly a big body of water and plenty of wind.

You have to do things like man the winch, steer, lower the jib and rush around the deck, and that's just when things are going well.

You also have to know your anatomy. In golf, you have doglegs. In the America's Cup, you have legs, six of them to be exact.

The entire race course covered some 18 miles and no dolphins were killed.

It's not much of a spectator sport unless you are a seagull or a helicopter pilot.

Television coverage of the sport is limited to a 10-second fly over. No matter which boats are racing, they all look the same. That's because all you can see are a bunch of huge white sails surrounded by water, water everywhere.

ESPN could show the same footage day after day and we wouldn't know the difference.

This America's Cup stuff isn't going to attract a huge following unless it makes some major changes.

First, four months is entirely too long for a sporting event. Even the NBA playoffs don't last that long.

I would pack all the racing into a single holiday weekend. I would add cannons to the yachts. This way you could really blow your competition out of the water and make all those sports highlight films.

You could earn bonus points for boarding your competitor's vessel and running up your flag while the losing sailors are forced to walk the gangplank.

I think you should be allowed to ram your opponent's vessel and generally act like Captain Hook.

This would appeal to the hockey crowd and spark a boom in the boat repair business.

Add a menacing shark like Jaws to the equation and the America's Cup could become a true spectator sport like Arena Football.

~Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.