MADRID (AFP) - Oracle's New Zealand skipper Russell Coutts needed nine stitches to close a cut in his leg after his catamaran capsized during an in-house regatta by the US team on Wednesday on Spain's Mediterranean coast.

Coutts, one of the most successful skippers in America's Cup history, sustained the injury while the crew were attempting to right the boat, Oracle said in a statement. There were no other injuries.

The other crew members on board were helmsman Franck Cammas of France, Jonathan Macbeth of New Zealand and Alberto Barovier of Italy.

The mast of the Extreme 40 catamaran broke during attempts to retrieve the boat, which had to be towed back to Oracle's base in Valencia, Spain.

The in-house regatta is part of Oracle's preparatiosn for its America's Cup multihull duel with Alinghi of Switzerland.

San Francisco-based Oracle, backed by US software tycoon Larry Ellison, will face defending America's Cup champion Alinghi, which is backed by biotech tycoon Ernesto Bertarelli, in a best-of-three showdown sometime in 2009.

The exact date will be set by a New York court later this year.

Coutts led teams from New Zealand to back-to-back Cups in the late 1990s before he and the core of his Kiwi crew joined Alinghi in 2000. He signed with Oracle in July 2007.