Ineos Britannia and Emirates Team New Zealand race during the Louis Vuitton 37th America's Cup Day 3 race 4 in Barcelona, Spain. (AP )

BARCELONA, Spain, Oct 14, (AP): Emirates Team New Zealand took another step toward retaining the America’s Cup after building a potentially demoralizing 4-0 lead over INEOS Britannia on Monday. The cup will go to the first yacht that reaches seven wins.

The Kiwis have three to go while the British boat has a huge deficit to make up. New Zealand's Taihoro made it four from four on the Barcelona beachfront after beating Britannia by 23 seconds. The two boats exchanged leads in the first leg, but the Kiwis made steady gains and were more than 350 meters in front when they crossed the finish line. "It’s nice just to keep marching forward,” said New Zealand's low-key skipper Peter Burling.

Burling's curbing of any enthusiasm likely comes from his team's scalding at the 2013 America's Cup, when it was up 8-1 before it collapsed and lost 9-8 to Oracle Team USA in San Francisco Bay. The team led by Grant Dalton rebounded from that with their cup victories in 2017 and 2021 and are now on course to become the first syndicate to triumph three times on the trot. And, ominously for Britannia, Burling said that his team still has room to improve. "(There's) a long way to go. I don’t think any team knows it better than us,” Burling said.

"We have a lot of things to work on as well. It feels like we haven’t sailed to our potential yet.” The British, however, had to admit their frustration as the quest to bring home the America's Cup for the first time in the race's 173-year history faded. "There is a lot of frustration on the team. Where we are right now is not where we want to be,” said Britannia trimmer Bleddyn Mon. "But there is a lot of drive on the team, and everyone here knew it was going to be a real battle against the Kiwis."