Holiday Breakfast

Luna Rossa team director Max Sirena has suggested the America's Cup crews need to start working on sailing off their foils in preparation for what's to come.
On Sunday, Team New Zealand and Ineos Team UK struggled through the first race of the Christmas Cup, ending up in a displacement race, with the hull of their vessels cutting through the water rather than sailing over the top of it, as the wind died away. Neither team finished the race within the 45-minute time period, and the day's events were subsequently abandoned.
The display prompted plenty of questions about the wind limits and whether the lower limit of 6.5knots had been set to low.
Speaking to the Herald after the regatta, Sirena said it was all a part of the game and Sunday's events may be a sign of things to come in both the Prada Cup Challengers' Series in January and the America's Cup match in March.
"It was interesting," Sirena said of seeing the New Zealand and British crews in a displacement duel. "It will happen again; you need to be ready for it and to be able to sail in displacement.
"You need to be practicing for that as well because it will happen again; we're going into a summer period with light breeze.
"I think the wind limit is not a problem. I think it's just the matter of racing; once you start you could have the wind drop, so it's part of the game."
Because the Christmas Cup was abandoned after one attempted race, Luna Rossa and fellow challenger American Magic had to settle for the three days of sailing afforded to them by the America's Cup World Series, which ran from Thursday to Saturday. While they were on the water on Sunday, their scheduled race was not run.
There is a chance the Christmas Cup could be rescheduled to a new date in the new year, however discussions around the viability of doing so were yet to take place.
But while they didn't get that fourth day of racing, Sirena said the week had been informative and gave Luna Rossa plenty to think about between now and the beginning of the Challengers' Series on January 15; particularly in terms of closing the gap between themselves and the Defender, Team New Zealand.
"It's going to be a development process to the end. It's a new class, we're discovering new things every day, new ways to sail the boat," Sirena said.
"These three days of racing has been massive and impressive, even from a spectator's point of view, we saw some exciting match racing and some exciting pre-starts so it's good.
"I think the Defender still has an edge on everyone. All three challengers need to improve quite a lot."
text by Christopher Reive, NZ Herald

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Like so many, 2020 was a hell of year for the New Zealand Warriors.
The NRL was one of the first sports competitions in the world to get re-started in this Covid world.
But the Warriors were forced to relocate to Australia for the season, remarkably almost made the playoffs, and won over many fans.
The hope for 2021 is that the club can, at least, have some home games.
CEO Cameron George joined Tim Dower to recap a rough year for the time, and what the hopes are for 2021.
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A growing list of European Union nations moved to ban flights from the U.K. on Sunday and others were considering similar action, in a bid to block a new strain of coronavirus sweeping across southern England from spreading to the continent.
France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Ireland and Bulgaria all announced restrictions on U.K. travel, hours after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced that Christmas shopping and gatherings in southern England must be cancelled because of rapidly spreading infections blamed on the new coronavirus variant.
Johnson immediately put those regions into a strict new Tier 4 restriction level, upending Christmas plans for millions.
France banned all travel from the U.K. for 48 hours from midnight Sunday, the prime minister's office announced. The French statement said that would buy authorities time to find a "common doctrine" on how to deal with the threat. It specified that "flows of people or transport to the U.K. are not affected."
Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said he was issuing a flight ban for 24 hours starting at midnight "out of precaution." Belgium also halted train links to Britain, including the Eurostar.
"There are a great many questions about this new mutation," he said, adding he hoped to have more clarity by Tuesday.
The German government said all flights coming from Britain, except cargo flights, were no longer allowed to land starting midnight Sunday. It didn't immediately say how long the flight ban would last, but news agency dpa reported it would be in place at least until Dec. 31.
Germany, which holds the rotating EU presidency, also called a special crisis meeting on Monday to coordinate the response to the virus news among the bloc's 27 member states.
The Netherlands banned flights from the U.K. for at least the rest of the year. Ireland issued a 48-hour flight ban. Austria and Italy said they would halt flights from the U.K. but did not say exactly when that would take place.
Italy's health minister, Roberto Speranza, said an order signed Sunday blocks flights from Britain and prohibits entry into Italy by anyone who has been in the U.K. in the last 14 days. The order bans plane travel until Jan. 6.
The Czech Republic imposed stricter quarantine measures from people arriving from Britain.
High-speed train operator Eurostar canceled its trains between London, Brussels and Amsterdam beginning Monday, but kept trains operating on the London-to-Paris route.
Johnson said Saturday that a fast-moving new variant of the virus that is 70% more transmissible than existing strains appeared to be driving the rapid spread of new infections in London and southern England in recent weeks. But he stressed "there's no evidence to suggest it is more lethal or causes more severe illness," or that vaccines will be less effective against it.
Beyond Europe, Israel also said it was banning flights from Britain, Denmark and South Africa because those were the countries where the mutation is found.
The World Health Organization tweeted late Saturday that it was "in close contact with U.K. officials on the new #COVID19 virus variant" and promised to update governments and the public as more is learned.
The new strain was identified in southeastern England in September and has been spreading in the area ever since, a WHO official told the BBC on Sunday.
"What we understand is that it does have increased transmissibility, in terms of its ability to spread," said Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO's technical lead on COVID-19.
Studies are under way to better understand how fast it spreads and and whether "it's related to the variant itself, or a combination of factors with behavior," she added.
She said the strain had also been identified in Denmark, the Netherlands and Australia, where there was one case that didn't spread further.
"The longer this virus spreads, the more...

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California hospitals are battling to find beds to house patients amid fears the explosion of coronavirus cases will exhaust staffing resources.
As of Saturday, nearly 17,400 people were hospitalized with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 infections — more than double the previous peak reached in July — and a state model that uses current data to forecast future trends shows the number could reach 75,000 by mid-January.
More than 3,600 confirmed or suspected COVID-19 patients were in intensive care units. All of Southern California and the 12-county San Joaquin Valley to the north have exhausted their regular intensive care unit capacity, and some hospitals have begun using "surge" space. Overall, the state's ICU capacity was just 2% on Saturday.
The enormous crush of cases in the last six weeks has California's death toll spiraling ever higher. Another 272 fatalities were reported Saturday and in the last week nearly 1,600 people died.
In hard-hit Los Angeles County, Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer implored people to stay home as much as possible, not mingle with others outside their household and wear a mask and social distance when around others.
"Places where people from different households gather and do not follow safety directives contributes to unnecessary COVID-19 spread that results in hospitalizations and deaths that could have been avoided," she said. "Following the safety measures saves lives and is our only way to protect essential workers and our hospitals."
LA County health officials announced Saturday they had modified their health orders to comply with recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings calling for places of worship to be allowed to have outdoor and indoor services, with appropriate health safety precautions.
On Saturday night, Apple Inc. announced that it is temporarily closing all 53 of its stores in California because of the coronavirus outbreak. Under the stay-at-home order in effect for nearly the entire state, retail stores are limited to 20% capacity.
As businesses struggle during what should be a very busy holiday shopping season, many hospitals are preparing for the possibility of rationing care. A document recently circulated among doctors at the four hospitals run by Los Angeles County calls for them to shift strategy: Instead of trying everything to save a life, their goal during the crisis is to save as many patients as possible. That means those less likely to survive won't get the same kind of care offered in normal times.
"Some compromise of standard of care is unavoidable; it is not that an entity, system, or locale chooses to limit resources, it is that the resources are clearly not available to provide care in a regular manner,"  the document obtained by the Los Angeles Times reads.
The county's Health Services director, Dr. Christina Ghaly, said the guidelines were not in place as of Friday night but that they were essential to develop given that the surge has arrived and "the worst is yet to come."
Many hospitals already have implemented emergency procedures to stretch staff and space.
Corona Regional Medical Center southeast of Los Angeles has converted an old emergency room to help handle nearly double the usual number of ICU patients. It's using space in two disaster tents to triage ER patients because the emergency room is filled with patients who need to be hospitalized.
In hard-hit Fresno County in central California, a new 50-bed alternate care site opened Friday near the community Regional Medical Center. The beds for COVID-19-negative patients will free up space in area hospitals, where just 13 of some 150 ICU beds were available Friday, said Dan Lynch, the county's emergency medical services director.
Lynch said he expects they will have to use the Fresno Convention Center, which can accommodate up to 250 patients, given current demand.
Fresno and three neighboring counties also have taken the...

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The Safety Warehouse didn't follow the law in its latest scheme.
The company's been fined $30,000 for sending thousands of unsolicited texts to potential customers, in an attempt to sell them face masks.

It follows its cash drop flop, where an Auckland crowd grew angry after receiving store vouchers instead of cash. 
Lisa Wilkin-Krug from the Department of Internal Affairs told Tim Dower the company was also warned before it escalated to a fine.
"With Covid going on, their product was related to that and they were really playing on that opportunity, but they also weren't being compliant."
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Australian states are incredibly nervous about the latest Covid-19 outbreak in New South Wales.
Sydney's northern beaches cluster has grown to 83 cases.
All states and territories are putting up restrictions against travellers from the greater Sydney area, with dozens of flights cancelled.  
Melbourne epidemiologist Tony Blakely told Tim Dower there are concerns there are cases outside of the city.
"It seems almost certain that there are some cases outside the northern suburbs in that greater Sydney area, which is what we are watching closely."
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As Covid-19 cases rapidly rise in the UK, Boris Johnson's defending the country's approach.
About 40 countries, including Spain, Hong Kong, India, Canada and Germany, have now suspended flights from the UK as a fast-spreading new strain is looked into.
France has completely closed its border, with no freight lorries or ferry passengers able to sail for 48 hours.
Despite this, the British Prime Minister says they've done the right thing to "keep moving forward".
He says staying in some form of lockdown, or keeping kids out of school for the best part of a year, would've been disastrous.
But political commentator Rod Liddle told Tim Dower the country is experiencing mass outrage, and panic.
"Boris Johnson has just given a press conference asking people politely not to stockpile goods.
"I would suggest the best way to stop people not stockpiling goods is not to scare the bejesus out of them in the first place, by saying there’s a new strain of this virus which is going to be more dangerous and so on."
Liddle says a perfect storm is brewing and it's assumed things will get worse.
He says the country's dealing with this new strain ... and also no news on a European trade deal for Brexit.
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NewstalkZB is back with another edition of Hidden Spots on Summer Breakfast.
This is where we take you on a bit of a virtual road trip around the country - and give you tips on attractions you may not know about.
It kicks off in the far north's Kaitaia, where you'll find the Gumdiggers Park.
It's an authentic Kauri gum digging site. Manager of the park John Johnson joined Tim Dower to discuss 
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Contact tracers are following dozens of lines of inquiry and officials are poring over CCTV footage as the NSW government scrambles to find the source of the growing cluster in Sydney's Northern Beaches.
Such is the mystery surrounding the outbreak that the state's chief health officer has speculated that finding 'Patient Zero' could be a "challenge beyond us".
Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced another 30 cases of community transmission on the peninsula on Sunday, bringing the number of cases associated with the cluster to 68.
Almost all of the new infections – 28 – are directly linked to the Avalon cluster while two are under investigation, but were diagnosed in people living near Avalon.
Genomic sequencing suggests the strain circulating in the community is of US origin might have come into the country via an infectious returned traveller who landed in Sydney on December 1.
However, chief health officer Kerry Chant said there was still "no-one" pinpointed who could have brought that virus strain to the Northern Beaches.
"There is no-one else we have identified that could be the source," Dr Chant said.
"At the moment we are forensically looking at all of the journeys of that individual to see if there were any points associated with it.
"There is an intensive investigation underway and while a really do want to find the source, it may be that this is going to be a challenge beyond us."

People line up at a Covid-19 testing site at Mona Vale Hospital on December 18 in Sydney. Photo / Getty Images
Dr Chant said the returned traveller, a woman, was infectious on the plane and stayed in hotel quarantine upon her arrival.
"We are trying to look and crossmatch any list, look for any people that may have been associated with anything to do with airports or quarantine facilities," she said.
"The investigation is far-ranging and we have a dedicated team and assistance looking at CCTV footage.
"We are being as thorough as we can. We probably have … at any one time, 10 or 20 lines of inquiry and we pursue them all concurrently.
"There is no one who wants to get to the bottom of this more than myself because if I understand the clear chains of transmission I can then better inform government about the risk.
"The problem we have at the moment is that I do not know how we got there so I do not know the person nor where that person has been."
Health Minister Brad Hazzard was asked whether the virus could have made its way to the Northern Beaches via a person who was exempted from hotel quarantine.
He told reporters there was "not a single case" where an exempted person had brought a positive case into the community.
Berejiklian was more confident about the prospects of finding the source.
"Of course it is a concern to us that health experts are yet to identify how the cluster was transmitted into the community or how it started in Avalon (but) we certainly will get to the bottom of that," she said.
Acting chief medical officer Paul Kelly said it was most important to find out where the cases had been while infectious.
"And also as is the normal case now, particularly in NSW, looking back from when they became infected to where they had been in the week or two before that," Professor Kelly said.
"That will give us many clues and hopefully that will also include where this missing link, if you like, may be."

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