From foil whisperer to head of design in the 37th America's Cup: Martin Fischer chases the Cup for the Kingdom

Martin Fischer has heralded his next summit assault in the America's Cup under the British flag. As chief designer for Sir Ben Ainslie's Ineos Britannia team, the 59-year-old German wants to help realise the English Cup chasers' dream of victory, which has now been unfulfilled for 171 years. Fischer studied hydrofoils decades ago in his diploma thesis at the Hamburg Institute of Naval Architecture and is also known in the sailing world as a foil whisperer. InExclusive interview in YACHT 3 (currently on newsstands!)the master of futuristic-foiling high-tech bullets talks about his dream job, the British Cup chances and his new life in England.

Will all good things come in threes for Fischer's new team? Sir Ainslie and his "Cup Knights" are chasing the most important silver jug in international sailing for the third time in a row. The British team failed off Bermuda in 2017 with a boat that was too slow, just as they did at the start of 2021 in the 36th America's Cup, when they lost to the Italian Luna Rossa Prada Pirellli team in the final of the challenger round. Martin Fischer was partly responsible for the fast Italian design back then. He has now switched to the British team and has his dream job:"From my point of view, it doesn't get much better than that. If you work in yacht design like I do, it's perhaps the most sought-after job in the world. I am very happy to be part of this team. It was my wish to come here."

From New Caledonia to Oxford: where Fischer now lives and works

In an exclusive interview, Martin Fischer talks about the merger of the Cup design team with the Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula 1 team, on whose premises in Brackley, UK, he and his team work around 100 kilometres north-west of London. Fischer and his wife have long since moved the centre of their lives from New Caledonia to England for this new role. They live in Oxford, from where Fischer drives to work in Brackley every day.

The difficult task ahead of him of providing the British with a boat capable of winning is not made easy by the rule that only one new build is allowed per team. "You have one shot, and that's it," says Fischer, summarising the challenge. According to Fischer, the team knows and recognises that things have not gone well in the past.Fischer explains: "Everyone realises that things didn't go well twice. But there is no fear or pessimism about that. We talk about it openly. Jim Ratcliffe said it almost literally at the team presentation: that the boat was simply too slow last time and we couldn't win with it. And that this has to change."

Fischer and the design masterminds at Ineos Britannia are competing for nothing less. Read what Fischer has to say about the new design ideas, the complexity of his work and other new and revolutionary Cup rules in the interview inYACHT 3 is now available at newsagents.

Meanwhile, the Cup world is awaiting the announcement of the future venue by the New Zealand defenders by the end of March, but possibly sooner. According to research by New Zealand journalist Richard Gladwell, three European harbours are currently in the running: Barcelona, Malaga and Cork.