he America's Cup these days is contested by an unprecedented number of sailing syndicates, representing ten nations and is watched by millions on television and thousands more on luxuriously - appointed spectator yachts. It consumes gobs of sponsors' money and, the skippers are paid one million or more to get the job done at 5 - 15 miles per hour through keel-snagging, rudder-shuddering seaweed and the like.

The America's Cup has always had a certain strangeness to it. The original one- hundred pounds prize was put up by the Royal Yacht Squadron during the Great Exhibition of 1851 and was won at Cowes on August 22nd. of that year by none other than the infamous New York Yacht Club's entrant, America. Although it was not the fastest boat, America exploited an ambiguity in the rules to race a shorter course around the Isle of Wight and left a close rival to go to the aid of another yacht in trouble. The New York Yacht Club then put the trophy up for permanent challenge every four years in modern times, by yachts from other "friendly" countries - but not before taking care to re-write the rules of the competition in its own favour and insisting that the defending club need only race against one challenger.

So, for 132 years, men who make normal male braggadocio look like a Buddhist picnic have been tempted, teased and tantalized, but more often than not frustrated in their holy pursuit of the now so famous grail.

In 1866, an English naval lieutenant turned up with a splendid recipe for success -- a yacht with a working fireplace in the saloon and a pet monkey among the crew. In 1895. Lord Dunraven formally accused the New York Yacht Club of cheating; and by the Thirties, Henry "Mike" Vanderbilt had installed himself as the Cup's permanent protector, much as his father Cornelius was before him. In the 1983, Alan Bond, the brash "Aussie" rested the Cup away from the US, but for only four years.

Since then, Dennis Connor and Bill Koch set new milestones by winning during the Cup's glorious and sometimes jaded recent times. The rest is history until the next challenge.