Ben Ainslie gets America's Cup funding from backer of Brexit and fracking

Ben Ainslie’s latest America’s Cup bid is being bankrolled to the tune of £110m by the billionaire pro-Brexit businessman Jim Ratcliffe, whose petrochemical company Ineos is one of the main fracking firms in the UK.

The most successful sailor in history, Ainslie is a four-time Olympic gold medalist. He won the America’s Cup in 2013 with the USA-based team Oracle, but the most prestigious event in world sailing has not been won by a British boat for 168 years.

The money will fund a two-boat challenge for the 36th America’s Cup, which will take place in New Zealand in 2021.

“The investment of Ineos leaves us with our best ever chance of bringing the America’s Cup home,” Ainslie said. Ratcliffe, who publicly declared his support for Brexit, said he was horrified by how long it had been without a British winner of the America’s Cup.

Ratcliffe co-founded Ineos, Britain’s biggest privately owned company, in 1998 and has grown it into one of the world’s top 10 petrochemicals businesses, leasing or buying unwanted assets from firms such as BP and ICI.

He is one of the main UK exponents of fracking, a controversial process of drilling down into the earth before a high-pressure water mixture is directed at the rock to release the gas inside.

The announcement of the backing was made at the Prospect of Whitby pub in Wapping, south London, where Ainslie said he felt the partnership with Ineos was a good fit despite the company’s support for fracking.

“Sustainability remains a big focus of the team,” Ainslie said. “Fracking is not a subject I’m an expert on, but I know having worked with Ineos for this partnership that they take their responsibilities with the environment extremely seriously and they’re a great partner.

“One of Ineos’s key areas is plastic and they absolutely share that desire to stop plastic going into the oceans.”