Scheidt closes the gap, but Percy has his hand on the Star gold medal

Iain Percy and Andrew Simpson (GBR) look likely to win the Olympic Star class on Sunday after finishing the 10 preliminary races eight points ahead of Robert Scheidt and Bruno Prada (Brazil). This means that the Brazilians must put at least three other boats between them and the Englishmen if they are to win on a countback.

Both crews had a win today but Scheidt closed the gap by a single poitn as his other placing was a third, to Percy's fourth. The other medal prospect, and not out of contention for gold if Percy and Scheidt get carried away with match racing each other, are Frederik Loof and Max Salminen of Sweden, who are on 30 points. There is then a long gap back to the Norwegians who are on 53 and the Poles on 54.

Laser Radial

Another event which is heading for a nail-biting medal race is the Women's Laser Radial. Evi Van Acker of Belgium holds a one point lead over Annalise Murphy of Ireland and a three pointlead over Marit Bouwmeester of The Netherlands with just two preliminary races to be sailed.

Today, Van Acker did herself no favours in race seven when she finished eighth, but she bounced back to win the next one. Murphy on the other hand was second behind Lijia Xu of China in the seventh race before fading to 10th in race eight. Bouwmeester's day included a third and a fourth, setting up a facinating final day of preliminary racing tomorrow.

Australia's Krystal Weir had a better day, finishing with a 7th and a 12th for 12th place overall, but she is 18 points away from 10th place and would need a miracle to make the medal race.

- Roger McMillan