A WEYMOUTH sailing expert is currently helming a GC32 in the Extreme Sailing Series.

Neil Hunter was invited to sail on the Land Rover Ben Ainslie Racing (BAR) Academy catamaran during act one, held in Muscat, and act two in Qingdao, China, of the series earlier this year.

During the acts, he played the role of bowman.

The third act of the Series began yesterday in Cardiff and Hunter was selected to skipper the vessel.

He will join the youngest team in the fleet.

Previously, the crew has been skippered by senior member Bleddyn Môn, with Hunter being the first Academy trialist to skipper the boat.

The team is made up of Land Rover BAR Academy trialists who will rotate throughout act three in Cardiff, which is taking place until Sunday, June 26.

After the training races ahead of the act, Hunter said: “We had a fairly mixed day of practice racing.

“We had winds from various directions on this small course.

“It makes racing very tricky.

“We’re a new team and we’re trialling out a bunch of new sailors here, so results were mixed, but we had some positive steps in our boat handling and crew work.

“I wasn’t really expecting to be skippering a team in the Extreme Sailing Series at 21 but it’s pretty cool.

“I’m super excited for this team.

“I think we’re going to achieve some cool things going forward.

“Cardiff was a tight venue in the Extreme 40 boats but now we’re in foiling GC32s, it’s going to feel a lot smaller.

“Generally in Cardiff, you get breeze and that puts even more pressure on us.

“If we’re doing 30 knots towards the shore, room to manoeuvre is going to run out quickly.

“We’re all about fitness at Land Rover BAR Academy and we’ve been working hard in the gym so hopefully we can get some good scores.

“Basically, as long as we’re getting better and improving our handling, then I think we will be happy.

“We’re very new and this is the first event where we’ve had a full youth team so, if our handling and communication improves, we’ll be very happy.”

Hunter has a fantastic track record in the 49er fleet.

He is a member of the British Sailing Team and in 2014 and 2015, he won the 49er National Championships.

He also finished fifth at the ISAF Sailing World Cup final.

He hopes to be part of the team for the Tokyo Olympics in 2020 and aims to win a gold medal sailing a 49er.

For more details on the series, visit extremesailingseries.com

After the Cardiff event, Hunter could race in up to five of the remaining events across the globe.