Voting has closed to decide the winners of three major categories at the British Sports Awards 2024; winners will be announced live on Sky Sports News on Wednesday 20 November; Stuart Broad, Mary Earps and Manchester City’s men’s team claimed the 2023 honours; who will take the top prizes this year?
By Lucy Blitz
For all the talk of the FA Cup’s rich past, the story behind the Ashes Urn, even the legacy of Wimbledon’s many accolades, one competition triumphs in age.
The coveted America’s Cup, the world’s oldest international sporting trophy, represents the peak of the sailing calendar – and after 173 years of hurt, INEOS Britannia came close to rewriting history with victory over New Zealand.
The triumph would have been the first for British sailing since the Cup’s birth, introduced through a race around the Isle of Wight in 1851, meaning the Auld Mug could have returned to home soil for the first time.
But it wasn’t to be and Britain fell short 7-2 in the final.
Despite falling at the final hurdle, history has already been made.
To win a title such as this marks true sporting greatness, but to reach the competition itself is a feat that cannot be undervalued – particularly for Great Britain, who have not lined up a boat in the match since 1964.
That is because the defenders of the race are guaranteed a spot in the following America’s Cup regatta, leaving only one possible avenue to the position of challenger – victory in the Louis Vuitton Cup.
For captain Sir Ben Ainslie and his crew, their decisive 7-4 triumph against Italy in the final stages of the qualifying event signalled a new dawn for the Brits.
Let us not forget, the Italians have represented one of the more talented sailing squads across the last three decades, challenging for the Cup in 2000 and 2021, as well as emerging as finalists in the Louis Vuitton series in 2007 and 2013.
But INEOS Britannia, spearheaded by an ever-growing relationship with the financial backing of Sir Jim Ratcliffe and the engineering expertise of Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team, seized control over Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli to finish the final race with a 17-second margin.
And that was all following a knockout stage against Switzerland, previous America’s Cup victors in 2007, during which Ainslie’s team clinched a 5-2 win to set up the battle with the Italians.
With a place in the grand finale secured, four-time Olympic gold medalist Ainslie praised the work of his crew and their supporters.
He said: “This is a massive day for our team.
“I want to say a massive thank you to everyone that has supported us as a team and British sailing in general, this moment’s for you.”
Most of Ainslie’s men were not born at the time of the most recent British effort 60 years ago.
But they came close to greatness again after years in the wilderness.
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