For a change, Prada of Italy suffered the setbacks as it lost by 34 seconds Tuesday, dropping its lead in the best-of-9 challenger finals to 3-2.

	AmericaOne leads Italy's Prada around the first windward mark during the fifth race.

It lost the start and fell for a fake gybe by AmericaOne skipper Paul Cayard that sent Prada out of control as it leaned at a sharp angle. And Prada helmsman Francesco de Angelis got hit in the head by the boom.

"What do you think?" he answered an inquiry about his condition. "Do I look so bad?"

No, but not as well as he did a day earlier.

That's when Prada held a 3-1 lead, giving it a chance to close out the series in Wednesday's sixth race. Now de Angelis must find a way to come back if he is to advance to the best-of-9 America's Cup finals against defending champion New Zealand starting Feb. 19.

"This is probably the hardest one to win of the four we've got to win. And tomorrow will be a good one and then we'll get it to 3-3," Cayard said, "Then we'll see how the other guys like the pressure."

AmericaOne had been losing expensive sails on a daily basis, suffering three spinnaker tears in the first four races. The crew work hasn't been as sharp as Cayard would like.

"We made a lot of mistakes today," he said. "I don't think anybody on our boat feels good about it."

At least none of his equipment or crew members suffered serious damage in Tuesday's wire-to-wire win in winds of 15 to 22 knots on the Hauraki Gulf.

There was no prerace collision as in the first race or torn spinnaker on AmericaOne as in the second. There were no injuries or equipment damage as in the third race when the U.S. team withdrew with less than one-third of the race remaining.

And there was no penalty in the last minute that forced AmericaOne to make an extra 270-degree turn and cost it the fourth race.

No, just a competitive race between two finely-tuned yachts trying to win sailing's top prize.

"You talk about the score at the end of the day," de Angelis said. "I don't think it changes the work that each team has to do on the water. We all expected the races to be tough."

In AmericaOne's other 44 races in the elimination rounds, it split eight spinnakers, the sail used at the front of the boat when sailing with the wind coming from behind.

So Cayard had to be relieved when the lime-green spinnaker filled perfectly as he started the final leg with a 42-second lead Tuesday.

Unlike Saturday, when high winds reaching 30 knots and wild waves battered AmericaOne in Race 3, Tuesday's conditions were milder as the boats sailed the 18½-mile race covering six legs, three downwind and three upwind.

Cayard is trying to duplicate his comeback in the 1992 challenger finals when he brought Il Moro di Venezia of Italy back from a 3-1 deficit against New Zealand. Il Moro won the series but lost the America's Cup final, 4-1 to America3.

AmericaOne, representing the St. Francis Yacht Club of San Francisco, has led from start to finish in the last two races. Only the penalty for blocking Prada's course in the charge to the end of Race 4 has kept it from a 3-2 lead.

Cayard dominated from the beginning Tuesday, crossing the starting line ahead of Prada for the fifth straight race. He led by seven seconds after aggressive prestart maneuvering.

Cayard made a big gain on the first leg, going into the wind, and led by 32 seconds heading into the second leg, with the wind at his back. But Prada closed the lead to 10 seconds at the second mark and by 18 seconds at the third. On the fourth leg, going downwind, Prada suffered on the fake gybe and ended it trailing by 26 seconds.

"We were looking for an opportunity to shake them," Cayard said. "They were pretty desperate to stay with us."

Then Cayard made his big gain, stretching the lead to 42 seconds with one leg remaining.

Before the third race, AmericaOne crewmen Greg Prussia and Curtis Blewett were injured when they went up the mast to fix a broken halyard. After that race, sail trimmer David McClintock was hurt when a line snapped as it was towing AmericaOne to port after the withdrawal.