Sailing-Lego's New Zealand boat a hit among America's Cup crews

BARCELONA, Spain : America's Cup crews in Barcelona have been busy building Lego models of New Zealand's AC75, with even British skipper Ben Ainslie finding time to piece one together with his young son.

New Zealand are holders of the America's Cup and being challenged for the "Auld Mug" by a British team led by Ainslie, who has made it his mission to "bring the Cup home" for the first time in its 173-year-history.

Ainslie's wife Georgie pictured the 47-year-old sailor and his son puzzling over the Lego Technic version of the Kiwi boat, with the actual AC75 having been shrouded in secrecy, in an Instagram post.

"That didn't take long. These two already trying to figure out some Kiwi secrets by building their Lego boat. Why don't we have a Lego boat @benainslie?" she said in last week's post.

Other British supporters responded online by calling on Lego to produce a model of "Britannia".

Several members of another America's Cup team, which did not make it through to the final, said they had bought the Lego kit, which is on sale in official stores in Barcelona, where the Kiwis lead Britain 4-2 in the first-to-seven series.

One said they had spent eight hours assembling the Lego bricks to build the New Zealand boat, which includes many of the intricate features of the monohull and its high-tech foils and is on sale for 140 euros ($152).

FAN ENGAGEMENT

Simon Munro, who runs the six America's Cup merchandise shops and its online store, said his company had sold "a few thousand" of the kits in addition to those sold by Lego itself.

"The day that we released it on online, Team New Zealand posted about it and they actually said it was one of the best fan engagement posts they've ever done," said Munro.

It took about 18 months of