One hundred and seventy-five years. That is how long Great Britain has been trying to win the America’s Cup. The trophy was literally named after the yacht that humiliated the British fleet at Cowes in 1851, and in every edition since, Britain has failed to bring it home. GB1, operating as Athena Racing, is the latest campaign to carry that weight, and the story behind it is as turbulent as anything the America’s Cup has produced.
Ben Ainslie is the team principal. Four Olympic golds (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012) and one silver (1996) across the Laser and Finn classes make him the most decorated Olympic sailor in British history. His America’s Cup journey has been long, expensive, and marked by moments of brilliance and frustration in roughly equal measure. He was tactician aboard Oracle Team USA in 2013 when they staged the greatest comeback in Cup history, overcoming an 8-1 deficit to win 9-8 in San Francisco. He built INEOS Team UK, then INEOS Britannia, reaching the 2024 Cup Match in Barcelona only to lose 2-7 to Team New Zealand.
Then the split. INEOS withdrew from AC38 amid a dispute with Athena Racing over the British entry. The details are complicated, the emotions raw, and the result is that Ainslie now builds a new campaign with different backers under a different name. Athena Racing is the Challenger of Record, meaning it negotiates the protocol with the defender. That role carries significant influence over rules, schedule, and format. It also carries pressure: the Challenger of Record is expected to be competitive.
Dylan Fletcher takes the helm. Fletcher won Olympic gold in the 49er at Tokyo 2020 and then dominated SailGP Season 5 driving the Emirates Great Britain F50, winning the championship and the $2 million prize. He is proven under pressure, experienced on foiling boats, and hungry for the Cup. Ian Walker, the two-time Olympic medallist and Volvo Ocean Race winner, serves as CEO, adding strategic and operational depth.
The AC40 and AC75 platforms suit Fletcher’s skill set. These are foiling boats that move at terrifying speed, where split-second decisions on the helm separate winning from capsizing. Fletcher’s SailGP experience, where he routinely drove F50 catamarans at 100 kilometres per hour, translates directly.
Britain has come close before. Ainslie has come close before. The question hanging over GB1 is whether this fractured, rebuilt, restructured campaign can find the speed and the composure to do what 175 years of British sailing has not managed. The Preliminary Regatta in Cagliari in May 2026 will be the first competitive test. Ainslie will be watching from the shore. Fletcher will be on the water. And the Auld Mug, the oldest trophy in international sport, will still be in New Zealand’s hands.