New Zealander Russell Coutts, the three-time America’s Cup champion, won the King Edward VII Gold Cup, Stage 3 of the 2004-’05 Swedish Match Tour, with a 2-1 defeat of Australian James Spithill.

With the victory, Coutts gained 25 points toward the 2004-’05 Swedish Match Tour championship. He heads the leaderboard with the high score of 45 points after three of eight stages. The Swedish Match Tour champion will win a $60,000 bonus and a BMW 545i Touring from Tour partner BMW.

American Ed Baird, in second, trails by 5 points and reigning Tour champion Peter Gilmour of Australia is third with 30 points. The win was Coutts’s third on the Swedish Match Tour this calendar year.

Earlier he won the Toscana Elba Cup – Trofeo Locman in Porto Azzurro, Italy, and the Swedish Match Cup in Marstrand, Sweden. He also placed second at the Portugal Match Cup in Cascais, Portugal.

Overall, it was his fifth win in nine starts on the Swedish Match Tour since the 2000-’01 season.

Coutts sailing with Team Colorcraft crewmembers Jes Gram-Hansen (Åarhus, Denmark), Christian Kamp (Copenhagen, Denmark) and Rasmus Kostner (Åarhus, Denmark), were awarded the championship of the Investors Guaranty Presentation of the King Edward VII Gold Cup and the $30,000 prize when today’s racing was canceled shortly after 12:30 p.m.

Spithill, the 26-year-old helmsman of Italy’s Luna Rossa Challenge for the 32nd America’s Cup sailing with Magnus Augustsson, Charlie McKee and Joe Newton, placed second and won $18,000.

Baird, sailing with Andy Horton, Piet van Nieuwenhuyzen and Jon Ziskind, finished third and won $11,500. They scored a 2-1 victory over Scott Dickson, who sailed with Sonny Gibson, Allan Lindsay and Dave Ridley. They placed fourth and won $9,000.

For Coutts the victory was his seventh King Edward VII Gold Cup title since 1990. Considering he didn’t sail in 1999 and 2002 due to America’s Cup Class racing in New Zealand, he’s won seven titles in 13 years and becomes the all-time winner of the trophy first awarded in 1937. Previously he won in 1990, ’92, ’93, ’96, ’98 and 2000.

Racing was canceled today due to what the Bermuda Weather Service described as an extra-tropical weather system to the north of Bermuda. It produced westerly winds gusting up to 50 knots and a 3- to 5-foot sea on sheltered Hamilton Harbor. The strong winds coupled with the rough sea state forced Principal Race Officer H. Charles Tatem to cancel the planned races.