Rickham and Birrell, the defending world champions in the competition following their victory in Weymouth last year, took the lead by claiming first place in the first race of the day and fourth place in the second race.

Just behind the duo in the race for overall victory are the American team of Jennifer French and Jean-Paul Creignou, who made a big improvement to move from sixth place to second while the Australian team of Daniel Fitzgibbon and Liesl Tesch are not far behind in third.

In the 2.4mR course the leading trio of France's Damien Seguin, the Netherlands' Theirry Schmitter and Canada's Paul Tingley thrashed it out again.

Seguin tenaciously clung to a lead while Schmitter lies in second and Tingley in third place as they head into the final day of competition.

In the Sonar class, Aleksander Wang-Hanse, Marie Solberg and Per Eugen Kristiansen of Norway had a remarkable day with two firsts to overtake the British team of John Robertson, Hannah Stodel and Steve Thomas, who now lie in second position.

Coming third overall on the fourth day of racing was Netherlands' Udo Hessels, Marcel van deVeen and Mischa Rossen, who edged out France's Bruno Jourdren and crew with fifth and third places.

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