Alinghi skipper Russell Coutts lifts the America's Cup

Alinghi became the first European team to win the trophy after taking an unassailable 5-0 lead in the best-of-nine race series.

"I'm incredibly proud of what we achieved with Alinghi," he said. "We didn't really have any big weaknesses."

Coutts dismissed the plaudits that came his way after his record 14th win in America's Cup match races, one better than US sailor Dennis Conner's previous record.

"I don't care about personal records," he said. "I'm just proud of what the team has achieved."

They sailed an incredibly good regatta and were totally dominant throughout Team New Zealand skipper Dean Barker

Syndicate head Ernesto Bertarelli revealed that the emphatic win exceeded his wildest expectations.

"Everybody says my dream was to win this but in reality I just wanted to put a good team together, a team we could be proud of and maybe capable of winning," he said.

"I never thought we'd get there like this. Everybody knew we had a strong sailing team but nobody ever expected us to have the fastest boat.

"I think there's a lot of credit to be given to the design team who, at the end of the day came out with the fastest boat of the whole Cup."

A disappointed New Zealand side paid tribute to their opponents, admitting that the challengers had simply outperformed the favourites from start to finish.

"What can you say, they've been phenomenal," Team New Zealand skipper Dean Barker said.

Alinghi celebrate a famous victory

"They sailed an incredibly good regatta and were totally dominant throughout."

The defending champions were plagued by mechanical failures - including gear problems and broken spinnakers - throughout and failed to finish two of the five races.

"It's not a very good thing to have two gear breakages, that side of things is very disappointing," said Barker.

But the team denied suggestions that the defence had been done 'on the cheap' - the budget amounted to �28.5m

"Money was not a factor," insisted Tom Schnakenberg, syndicate head of Team New Zealand. "We made up a budget and we got what we asked for."