Larry Ellison Plays Hooky for America's Cup

 Larry Ellison better not be mad if one of his employees skips work to go sailing in the future

Who among us hasn't skipped out or provided a less than 100% truthful excuse to get out of work and go sailing? Well in that way Larry Ellison, owner of Oracle Team USA and third richest man in the country, is no different for the rest of us.

The theme of the 34th Americas Cup should probably be "Go Big or Go Home," with the cup being defined by big money, big disasters,  and big comebacks. Ellison certainly kept to that motto by skipping out on his keynote address at the Oracle Open World Conference to be out on the water to see Jimmy Spithill and company win race 17 and 18 on the San Francisco Bay yesterday. The 60,000 attendees at the conference did not seem to take too kindly to Ellison's absence.

"I was disappointed," Steve Katz, a Hewlett-Packard Co. employee who traveled from Hartford, Conn., to attend Oracle OpenWorld told Fox News. "I guess Larry's boat is more important to him than all these people here."

Jonathan Bloom of Bloomberg TV posted this tweet soon after it was announced Ellison was skipping out.

But some of the irate techies may have begun to see the light on the magic of the America's Cup because less than an hour later Bloom sent out another tweet.

 

Regardless of how attendees at Oracle World feel, you can bet that Ellison is going to be back out on the water today at 4:15 when Oracle Team USA and Emirates team New Zealand face off in a winner-take-all race 19.