Australian sailors finish on a high

The host nation enjoyed a golden finish on the final day of the ISAF World Sailing Championships in Western Australia yesterday, finishing as the leading country.

Four gold medals were decided yesterday, with Australia claiming two to take its tally for the 16-day event to three out of 10 golds available during the regatta.

Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen steered clear of any last-day dramas to claim the men’s 49er skiffs gold and then Tom Slingsby wrapped up his win in the men’s Laser.

Outteridge and Jensen only had to avoid finishing last in the double points medal race yesterday to take the gold, and eventually finished third behind Denmark’s Jonas Warrer and Soeren Hansen.

It was Outteridge’s third world championship gold and his second with Jensen.

In a dramatic finale, the US pairing of Erik Storck and Trevor Moore led for much of the race as they tried to sneak onto the podium, but on the penultimate leg were forced out of the race by a capsize caused by a broken rudder.

That allowed New Zealand’s Peter Burling and Blair Tuke to finish second and claim silver on a countback, while Danish brothers Emil and Simon Toft Nielsen took bronze.

British pair John Pink and Rick Peacock led the field early in the week and went into the medal race in third place, but were the last of the nine teams to finish and dropped out of the medals as a result.

World number one Slingsby took a 14-point lead into the medal race in the Lasers and secured his fourth world title in style by winning so comfortably he even had time to repeatedly wave to the crowd.

Great Britain’s Nick Thompson took the silver and New Zealand’s Andrew Murdoch the bronze, while Germany’s Simon Grotelushcen dropped out of the medals by finishing seventh.

Spain’s Tara Pacheco and Berta Betanzos claimed the gold medal in the women’s 470, despite finishing seventh in the medal race.

The pair took a commanding 11-point lead into yesterday’s race, and won the gold by five points from Great Britain’s Saskia Clark and Hannah Mills, who snatched the silver by winning yesterday.

The bronze medal went to New Zealand’s Jo Aleh and Olivia Powrie.