There’s been no shortage of praise for Australian Sailing Team Laser coach Michael Blackburn over the years, but the Sydney 2000 Olympic medallist’s ability to continue to manage, mentor and inspire the nation’s top single-handed dinghy sailors two years on from the Rio Games might be among his greatest achievements.

Despite unusual offshore winds at Aarhus on the second day of Laser racing, Blackburn’s squad showed its composure with Olympic champion Tom Burton heading a group of three Australians in the top 5 of the 165-boat competition and five Aussies filling the top 16 places.

Burton scored a win in Race 4 in his fleet and is 3rd overall, four points behind leader Sam Meech of New Zealand. Teammates Luke Elliott and Matt Wearn are two points further back, Finn Alexander is 12th and Mitch Kennedy 16th.

“I seemed to turn things around a bit today,” said Wearn, who won Race 3.

Laser Coach Michael Blackburn. PHOTO: Beau Outteridge

“Yesterday I didn’t feel like I achieved what I wanted to achieve. I seemed to be a bit more on track today, despite the trickier conditions. Now it’s a matter of finishing off qualifying tomorrow with two more decent results to into finals with. I think that’s going to be key, to keep that consistency there.”

Of Blackburn’s leadership, Wearn said: “It’s just testament to what we’ve been doing over the past 18 months or two years since Rio. The group’s been training well together and obviously it’s showing here, the peak event of the year. All the guys are in the top 15 or 16 places. Hopefully we can stay around that for the rest of the regatta and show the world what we’ve got.”

Australia’s big guns in the 470, Mat Belcher and Will Ryan, moved up from 10th overnight to 4th, six points shy of leaders Anton Dahlberg and Fredrik Bergstrom of Sweden.

“Today we had a little bit more breeze than the first couple of days, a nor-wester which was quite shifty,” Belcher said.

“We were down on one of the deeper courses, so I guess it was a bit more stable than some of the boats that were racing closer to shore.

“We had two different pressure systems come through right and left and you had to really hedge one side or the other. To come away with a 2 and a 4 is pretty good.

“The format’s a little bit different, we spend about 60 per cent of the event in qualifying. So we’re really looking forward to tomorrow off, trying to recharge and recover the best that we can and then starting the actual event, I guess.

“We’re in a pretty good position, pretty close. … The points are super close, which you would expect in qualifying, so we’ll just keep doing what we’re doing and hopefully that’s going to be enough in a couple of days to put ourselves in a good position coming in to the medal race.”

Racing got underway for the 49erFX and 49er classes. David Gilmour and Joel Turner are 7th after winning Race 2 while, in the FX, Amelia Stabback and Ella Clark are 9th.

Amelia Stabback (L) and Ella Clark have started their regatta strongly. PHOTO: Beau Outteridge

“Pretty happy with today,” Clark said.

“Our aim was just to keep consistent. We got some offshore breeze, which was pretty shifty and pretty tricky. So we’re pretty happy to come away with two 5ths and a 13th. We’re just got to keep consistent.”

Gilmour said: “During the first race we were in the lead, approaching the top mark and Joel fell overboard. He was adjusting the trapeze and let go of it, the hook dropped out and he slipped in. We lost about 50 metres from the whole incident. The 49er fleets are packed so it’s hard to call any rivals at this stage. The points are so close, we are just focused on not making any mistakes.”

Will Phillips and Iain Jensen are 15th. PHOTO: Beau Outteridge

The Nacra 17 regatta starts tomorrow and the Finns and the 470 men’s and women’s groups have a rest.

FAST FACTS

Approximately 1500 sailors from 100 countries are competing at Aarhus in 1100 boats.

This is the fifth edition of the Sailing World Championships. The event is held every four years.

The previous World Championships were held at Cadiz, Spain (2003), Cascais, Portugal (2007), Perth, Australia (2011) and Santander, Spain (2014).

Australia won four medals at Santander: Mat Belcher and Will Ryan (gold 470M), Tom Burton (silver, Laser), Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen (bronze, 49er) and Jason Waterhouse and Lisa Darmanin (bronze, Nacra 17).

At the past three Olympic Games Australian sailors won five gold medals and four silver medals.

HOST SITE - www.aarhus2018.com

RESULTS

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The Australian Sailing Team will have daily coverage, including video highlights, interviews, photographs and stories on our website and social media channels. See addresses below.

AUSTRALIAN TEAM AND SQUAD RESULTS

Finn

Jake Lilley – 20, (23), 6, 2, 15, 9 – 23rd

(Tom Slingsby) – 11, 18, 16, 17, 18, (21) – 37th

Oliver Tweddell – 11, 17, (24), 21, 24, 15 – 41st

Lewis Brake – (34), 14, 23, 17, 30, 30 – 50th

Jock Calvert – (44), 24, 17, 26, 30, 25 – 53rd

470M

Mat Belcher/Will Ryan – 3, (13), 8, 4, 2, 4 – 4th

Chris Charlwood/Josh Dawson – 19, 12, 10, (20), 9, 16 – 28th

470W

Nia Jerwood/Monique de Vries – (35), 16, 14, 22, 29, 24 – 25th

Dana Tavener/Katherine Shannon – 27, 41, 26, 40, 41, (46) – 42nd

Laser

Tom Burton – 1, 5, (6), 1 – 3rd

Luke Elliott – (13), 1, 2, 6 - 4th

Matt Wearn – (7), 4, 1, 4 – 5th

Finn Alexander – 6, 7, 5, (42) – 12th

Mitch Kennedy – 8, 10, (22), 3 – 16th

Laser Radial

Zoe Thomson – (28), 15, 4, 24 – 34th

Elyse Ainsworth – 21, 27, (28), 23 – 57th

Mara Stransky – 27, 34, (43), 41 – 79th

49er

David Gilmour/Joel Turner – 5, 1, (15) – 7th

Will Phillips/Iain Jensen – 3, (19), 6 – 15th

Lachy Gilmour/Ryan Donaldson – (20), 13, 7 – 35th

Kurt Hansen/Harry Morton – 15, (27), 18 – 69th

49erFX

Amelia Stabback/Ella Clark - 5, 5, (13) – 9th

Natasha Bryant/Annie Wilmot - 7, 13, (14) – 26th

Tess Lloyd/Jaime Ryan – (21), 20, 18 – 48th

Nacra 17

Jason Waterhouse/Lisa Darmanin

Nathan Outteridge/Haylee Outteridge

Paul Darmanin/Lucy Copeland

Conor Nicholas/Hayley Clark

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