If the loss of vital funding, the right to host next year’s Louis Vuitton America’s Cup Qualifiers and a team shake up is having a detrimental impact on Emirates Team New Zealand, then they are certainly not showing it.

Team New Zealand have endured their fair share of setbacks off the water which, at one stage, left their 35th America’s Cup campaign teetering on the brink.

On the water, however, a completely different story has been unfolding with Emirates Team New Zealand leading the overall Louis Vuitton America’s Cup World Series pecking order heading into this week’s Bermuda leg.

“Things have not been that easy for the last couple of years but if it was easy then everybody would do it and be involved in the America’s Cup,” Glenn Ashby, the Emirates Team New Zealand helmsman/sailing team director, said.

“It’s not an easy game and it’s a hard one to win but hopefully we are putting the pieces together now, particularly in the last few months that can help us go ahead and be successful in 2017.”

The Kiwis, the only team to have been in the top three in every race so far, knocked Land Rover BAR off the top with victory at the previous World Series event in Gothenburg. They will now be looking to build on that momentum when America’s Cup racing takes place in Bermuda for the first time with a star-studded sailing team backed by tremendous support staff back at the boatshed.

“We need to have the best guys to sail the yacht and on the actual America’s Cup side of things you have to have a good design team that can provide a good yacht,” Ashby said.

“I think we are very fortunate that we have a great group of guys on and off the water.”

In 24-year-old Peter Burling the Kiwis have unearthed a gem. The youngest helmsman on the cup circuit helped guide the Kiwis to second and first in the first two legs of the World Series and along with Emirates Team New Zealand team-mate Blair Tuke has won 20 consecutive regattas in the 49er.

It is a phenomenal streak stretching back to the pair’s silver medal display at the 2012 London Olympics which went some way towards them being nominated this week for the ISAF Rolex World Sailor of the Year for the second successive time.

Ashby has also been in the limelight lately, capturing a ninth A-Class World Championships title in Punta Ala, Italy, last month, his sixteenth world title overall.

“We’ve got some excellent guys on the team and it does rub off on everyone,” Ray Davies, the Emirates Team New Zealand tactician, said. “It just picks everyone up and creates a really good atmosphere to be working in. It’s infectious.”

Although the results of late have been encouraging, Davies said there is always room for improvement as the Kiwis bid to regain the “Auld Mug” which they surrendered to Swiss Challenger Alinghi in 2003.

“We’re in great shape at the moment and we want to keep that momentum going,” he said. “We’ve had a couple of good regattas but we are still learning a lot, so we have been analzying everything we’ve done so far and we’ve still got a lot to improve on.

“We are just going to try and keep chipping away and make sure we are diligent in our debriefs and always have an attitude of learning.”

Ashby, who won the 33rd America’s Cup with Oracle Team USA’s forerunner BMW Oracle Racing, is champing at the bit for World Series Bermuda racing to get under way.

“I was here in May for a few days to have a look around,” he said. “But coming here this time to race with the guys on the AC45F for the World Series is a real pleasure and we’re looking forward to getting out on the course and sailing on the waters of Bermuda.”