Emirates Team New Zealand, the Louis Vuitton America’s Cup World Series leaders, resumed testing their first development AC45 in Auckland this week.

The challenger for the 35th America’s Cup have been putting the wing-sail foiling catamaran, which they borrowed from America’s Cup syndicate Luna Rossa Challenge, through its paces in perfect summer conditions.

“Already this week has been the most exciting and rewarding of this whole campaign for the team,” Ray Davies, the Team New Zealand tactician, said.

“We were ripping it up around the harbour putting some good time into our manoeuvres and speed which was great fun on top of the usual systems testing and improvements,”

This week’s tests started what will be the most significant year of development in the present America’s Cup cycle, as the Kiwis step up their bid to reclaim the coveted “Auld Mug” they came to within a point of winning in San Francisco two years ago.

“Obviously we still have an enormous amount of work to do this year, it’s daunting actually,” Glenn Ashby, the Team New Zealand skipper and sailing team manager, said.

“But to be honest everyone here seems really fired up, and eager to attack the mountain we have to climb to get to the level we need to be at to win this America’s Cup.

“We have had some guys working hard over the holidays continuing to develop the platform, from where it was prior to Christmas.

“And from the get-go leaving the dock this week we could already tell there have been some great improvements.”

Despite suffering several setbacks including the controversial sacking of former team skipper Dean Barker, Team New Zealand have demonstrated they will be a force to be reckoned with.

They are top of the World Series leaderboard by ten-points over nearest rivals Oracle Team USA, the defender, and have reached the podium at all three events in the two-year series, which resumes in Oman from February 27 to 28.

The World Series is the first stage of competition for the America’s Cup, which will be in Bermuda in 2017.

Featuring all of the America’s Cup teams, the series is an opportunity to earn points that will count towards the America’s Cup qualifiers and play-offs, which will determine the challenger for the America’s Cup.

The challenger will compete against defender Oracle Team USA.