Red Bull design guru Adrian Newey has been linked with Britain's bid to win the America's Cup in 2017.

At the launch of the 2017 campaign, the 35th in the event's history, Four-time Olympic champion Sir Ben Ainslie, who played a leading role in Oracle Team USA's victory remarkable last year, and who is heading the British challenge, admitted that he would like Newey, who has won F1 titles with three different teams, on board.

"He's keen to help us but he has a lot of other commitments with F1," Ainslie told BBC Radio 5 live. "We've just got to see how his timing works out in the coming months and years but he would be a huge asset."

On Sunday, hours before the start of the Canadian Grand Prix which one of his cars went on to win, it was announced that Newey will continue with Red Bull on a new "multi-year" contract which will allow his to focus on things other than F1.

Widely seen as a move to keep him from moving to the opposition, Ferrari understood to be particularly interested in recruiting him, Newey's new deal will see him "advising and mentoring" the F1 team.

Quick to dismiss claims that Newey was essentially retiring from designing F1 cars, a claim which followed a fairly emotional speech from the Briton ahead of the race, Red Bull was unable to shed further light on what other projects he might be working on from here on. Fact is, Newey has made no secret in the past of his desire to work on projects well away from the F1 race track including racing yachts.

"He's a fantastic guy, clearly the most successful Formula 1 designer in history and very passionate about sailing, about the America's Cup," said Ainslie.

Chris Balfe