Sailing: Burling and Tuke lead world champs

Tauranga's Peter Burling, right, and Blair Tuke lead the field going into tomorrow's final day of the 49er World Championships in Argentina. PHOTO/FILE

Peter Burling (Tauranga) and Blair Tuke will take a 12 point lead into the final day of the 2015 49er and 49erFX World Championships, as they attempt to take the 49er crown for 2015 and make it three back-to-back world titles.

Recently named 2015 ISAF Rolex World Sailor of the Year, Burling and Tuke are in a good position to extend their unprecedented winning streak in the Olympic skiff class. Victory in Argentina would make it 23 consecutive wins in the 49er class.

After no racing was possible on day four of the regatta, an early start was scheduled for day five in an attempt to allow for plenty of catch-up racing. Both the men's and women's gold fleets sailed four races apiece under sunny skies, but not without light wind interruptions.

"It has been a really long day on the water," Burling said. "We got one race off before a three hour delay then into the final three races."

Time spent racing and training in Argentina in the lead-up to the 2015 World Champs highlighted that this was a venue with a unique set of challenges.

Burling and Tuke placed 2nd in what was the opening race of the finals series, then suffered a mid-fleet finish with a 15th in the next. Adding a 9th after that, the Kiwis then took a race win to end the day on a high note.

"Today was some of the shiftiest racing we have done in a long time; huge gains and losses," Burling said. "We were pleased to come away with a solid enough day, all things considered."

Meanwhile Alexandra Maloney and Molly Meech (Tauranga) will go into the final day of racing 8th overall in the women's 49erFX Championship. Like their male team mates their results were mixed and ended on a high - 8, 19, 7, 1.

Denmark's Ida Marie Nielsen and Marie Olsen are leading from Martine Grael and Kahena Kunze of Brazil.

The schedule for tomorrow is to sail three more finals races for the gold fleets before the top ten in both the 49er and 49erFX duke it out in the medal races.