He has already pulled off one surprise win against the odds. Now the chief executive of London's successful Olympic bid is planning to do for sailing what he did for athletics by bringing the America's Cup, the most prestigious contest in yachting, back to Britain after a gap of more than 150 years.

Keith Mills, who masterminded the bid for the 2012 Games alongside Lord Coe, has revealed that he is putting together a British team to challenge for the sailing trophy, thought to be the longest-running contest in international sport. If Britain wins the race it will host the following year's competition.

Mills said this weekend that he hoped to raise about £60m to finance the British challenge, which will take to the water in 2009. He is leading a group of businessmen who plan to put in about £10m and then look for sponsors.

He has already approached a number of top British sailors, including some Olympic medal winners, with a view to signing them up as crew.

The next America's Cup takes place off Valencia in Spain in 2007 but the deadline for entries has closed. Mills is expected to challenge whoever wins that race, eventually going head to head as early as 2009.

Mills, a keen sailor, said: "We haven't been able to win it for more than a century and it's about time we did. The way it works is I'd be part of a syndicate of owners. So I'd be responsible for putting a team together, raising the finance - basically what I did for the Olympics."

"I think it's a tragedy that the America's Cup was started as a British competition, then we lost it," said Mills. "It shouldn't be like this. Sailing is one of our strongest sports. We have the best yacht builders and the best boat yards."

He expects to buy the equipment and support network from one of the teams that competes in the 2007 Cup as a "starter pack" in order to assess the scale of the challenge. He then plans to design and build a boat to take the trophy from whoever holds it after the 2007 competition.

"It's a new challenge and we need a clean sheet of paper," he said. "We need the best people in the world".