A torn spinnaker was only part of the problem for AmericaOne on Saturday.

Prada of Italy sailed through heavy wind and waves relatively unscathed, taking a 2-1 lead in the best-of-9 challenger finals Saturday when the American boat, too damaged to continue, withdrew with less than one-third of the 18½-mile race left.

The list of breakdowns was long -- the main halyard, the jib halyard, a burst spinnaker, a damaged mast, the boom vang, and a sail lost overboard.

"We also broke a batten," skipper Paul Cayard said. "I forgot that. Sorry."

And those were only the problems during the race in which, Cayard said, wind reached a powerful 30 knots.

Bowman Greg Prussia was hospitalized briefly with bruises on one leg and both arms after he slammed into the rigging near the top of the mast while trying to fix the main halyard problem 40 minutes before the race.

After the race, sail trimmer David "Moose" McClintock was smacked in the back by the hauser, a towline, that broke loose as AmericaOne was being taken to port.

"It snapped and almost killed Moose," Cayard said. "Luckily it hit him in the back. ... I've heard stories about guys in the North Sea getting their heads chopped off when the hauser breaks."

Ralf Steitz was rushed from the AmericaOne compound by helicopter and rubber boat to replace Prussia. While Prussia will be sidelined a few days, McClintock shouldn't miss a race. Heavy wind predicted for Sunday could postpone the fourth race. There's no racing Monday because the Hauraki Gulf will be filled with boats celebrating Auckland's 160th anniversary.

Cayard's team will be busy fixing AmericaOne as it tries to advance to the best-of-9 series for sailing's top prize against defending champion New Zealand starting Feb. 19.

"There's no point in whining," said Cayard, who plans to use the mast from his backup boat.

While Cayard chuckled at his misfortune, Prada skipper Francesco de Angelis was pokerfaced.

"We didn't break anything," he said. "We just tried to take care of the boat."

When it quit, AmericaOne flew a red protest flag because Cayard felt the wind was stronger than the 18-knot maximum for beginning the race. It withdrew the protest since, Cayard said, the flag had to be flown at the start.

One day after the Gulf was smooth as a pane of glass, the race postponed because of light wind, the course had changed into a turbulent swirl of hazards to men and boats.

The race started on time in wind of 19 knots that surged to more than 25. At one point on the first leg of the six-leg race, a sailor bailed water out from the deck with a blue pail. Billy Bates, feeding sails out from the sewer beneath the AmericaOne deck, was drenched.

The Americans led by 14 seconds at the end of the first leg. Then they ran into trouble on the next leg when their spinnaker touched Prada's rigging, a penalty for AmericaOne. It would have had to make an extra turn had it not withdrawn.

The contact caused sail problems for AmericaOne as its spinnaker fluttered and Prada took a 23-second lead after that first downwind leg. The lead grew to 45 seconds midway through the race, but things got worse for AmericaOne.

About halfway to the fourth mark, its spinnaker split into two pieces horizontally near the top between the names of two sponsors printed in blue on the lime-green sail. One remnant flew uselessly from the top of the mast, the other dragged in the water. While that was happening, a sail on deck fell into the Gulf.

AmericaOne, which had gained before the mishap, trailed by 51 seconds at the fourth mark and didn't reach the fifth.

Under rules of the challenger finals, Cayard cannot request a delay of Sunday's race to handle structural problems.

Prada won the first race by 24 seconds. In Thursday's second race, AmericaOne won by 1:33 despite a minor mishap in which another spinnaker suffered a small rip as it was brought out of the hatch. It was quickly replaced.