SAILOR Adam Lees is preparing for the challenge of a lifetime.

The Honley sailor is in contention to compete in one of the world’s toughest sailing race.

Adam is part of the GBR Youth Challenge and hopes to bring the Red Bull Youth America’s Cup back home.

It’s the youth version of the America’s Cup World Series, which Olympian Ben Ainslie is in training for.

Adam’s youth team will compete at the selection series in San Francisco between February 18 – 24 using the same AC45 catamarans as the America’s Cup World Series.

Adam, 23, said: “The America’s Cup is the greatest thing you can do in sailing.

“The youth version is about getting more people involved in the competition and making it more accessible to young sailors so the next generation of people are involved early on.”

Adam and his seven crewmates will be competing against 11 other nations for the chance to sail in the first Red Bull youth series.

After the selections, teams will go into an intensive training programme before the race gets underway in September.

Adam, a former Honley Junior School pupil, started sailing aged 11 with his father, Tim Lees, at Boshaw Whams reservoir at Hade Edge.

They started in a Graduate sailing dinghy before Adam began competing on the Yorkshire and Humberside circuit and then moving into yachting and extreme sailing.

“My background is in sailing dinghies and then on yachts on the south coast of England, near where I went to university in Plymouth,” he added.