Hannah Mills: Olympic Champion to trial with Sir Ben Ainslie's Great Britain SailGP team
- Published
Sir Ben Ainslie and Hannah Mills were Great Britain teammates at London 2012
Olympic Champion Hannah Mills is to trial for a place in the Great Britain SailGP team for the global sailing championship in 2021-22.
She will join the team - skippered by the world's most successful Olympic sailor, Sir Ben Ainslie - for the Bermuda Sail Grand Prix on 24-25 April.
The team also includes Olympic champions Iain Jensen and Matt Gotrel.
"This is a big opportunity," said Mills, who will be the first female in the Great Britain SailGP team.
"I'm looking forward to working alongside the team to learn as much as I can during my time in Bermuda."
In the following two events after Bermuda, five more female athletes will trial with the team, before a final decision will be made on the successful athletes who will join the British team full-time.
Anna Burnet will trial with the team in Taranto, Italy, whilst Hannah Diamond, Ellie Aldridge, Nikki Boniface and Emily Nagel will complete their respective trials in Plymouth, UK.
"My fellow triallists are hugely talented and it will be a tough challenge to earn the full-time spot," said Mills.
"However, I'm a quick learner, a hard worker and incredibly motivated so it's down to me to make the most of it.
"SailGP is setting the standard for female inclusion in sailing, it will be particularly inspiring for young female sailors to know that these types of opportunities are available at the very top level of our sport."
Welsh sailor Mills, 33, is one of the favourites for the delayed Tokyo Olympic Games later this year alongside partner Eilidh McIntyre, having previously won gold in the Women's 470 class at Rio 2016 and a silver medal at London 2012 where she was a teammate of Ainslie in her first and his last Olympics.
"I first met Ben at an Optimist event when I was an over excited 11-year-old and he'd won his first Olympic medal, roll on 10 years and we were in the same team going to London 2012," said Mills.
"It was massive for me to be in a team with Ben watching and learning how he operated.
"The same will be true during this trip."
The second series of the Sail Grand Prix league features eight events, beginning in Bermuda before heading to Taranto, Italy (June 5-6), Plymouth, Great Britain (July 17-18), Aarhus, Denmark (August 20-21), Saint-Tropez, France (September 11-12), Cádiz, Spain (October 9-10), Christchurch, New Zealand (January 29-30, 2022) and culminating in the Grand Final in San Francisco, USA (March 26-27, 2022).
Ainslie's Great Britain team won the last SailGP event with a clean sweep in Sydney in 2020, before the remainder of the season was postponed due to Covid-19.