Team New Zealand boss Grant Dalton is confident his syndicate can make a successful switch if the America's Cup's future lies in multihull yachts.
The cup has traditionally been raced in monohulls, but this month's one-on-one duel between Swiss holders Alinghi and American challengers Oracle featured a giant catamaran against a giant trimaran.
Oracle's trimaran ended up turning the series off Valencia into a mismatch, easily winning 2-0 to return the Auld Mug to the United States.
The next regatta is expected to revert to its normal format of having several challengers.
However, Oracle, owned by software billionaire Larry Ellison and with New Zealander Russell Coutts as chief executive, have so far given no details about where or when it will be, or what type of boat will be used.
Dalton said today that Team NZ's strength lay in monohulls, but multihull racing, if a box rule were to be brought in to contain costs, offered an exciting challenge.
"We are a team that can adapt really quickly and just change direction, whereas a lot of teams would struggle to do that, or do it quickly," he said.
"If it went to multihulls, we would be into Extreme 40 sailing and that sort of thing instantly.
"There's a side of me that says it would be quite good because it would be exciting. Our strengths lie in monohulls, but we could adapt."
Dalton had no inside information on when Oracle and Italian syndicate Mascalzone Latino, who as challenger of record represents all challengers, would confirm the protocol for the next America's Cup.
At the same time, it wasn't something he was worrying about.
"We could easily get ourselves tied up in thinking about it," he said. "It will happen, just like it did the last time and the time before that.
"What type of boat is an issue. It will make us go one way or the other. We're just making sure we're ready to go either way."
Team NZ's immediate focus is on the Louis Vuitton Trophy event in Auckland next month, in which eight syndicates will take part.
Before then, skipper Dean Barker will be engaged in the Auckland match-racing regatta, which begins next Wednesday.
That event features a high-quality field including a host of America's Cup skippers as well as the new world match-racing champion, New Zealander Simon Minoprio.
Meanwhile, Louis Vuitton spokesman Bruno Trouble believed a move to multihulls would be detrimental to the America's Cup as a spectacle.
A former cup skipper, the Frenchman feared it would lead to too many one-sided contests.
"In a monohull, the difference between two boats is five or 10 percent of a knot," he said.
"In Valencia, we saw a difference of between two and four knot, so I don't believe match-racing in multihulls is a good solution."
What Trouble did say was good news was Oracle's defeat of Alinghi.
"We really believe the Americans will respect the America's Cup traditions and history, while we were not really confident with the Swiss," he said.
"So I think the Americans' winning the America's Cup is a good event, that's for sure."
