Olympic sailing: Spectacular: Buhl goes for World Championship gold on Sunday

Erik Heil won the bronze medal at the 49er World Championships with Thomas Plößel on Saturday and qualified for an Olympic start for the second time in a row. But his thoughts were already wandering to the other side of Australia's Phillip Bay shortly before his own award ceremony. That's where his buddy Philipp Buhl will be competing for World Championship gold on Sunday after another outstanding performance. "I hope so much for him, I'll be praying," said Heil with a smile, "Buhli deserves it so much. I would go completely crazy if he became world champion." Never before has a German laser sailor been world champion. It has been 20 years since Roland Gäbler and René Schwall in the Tornado were the last German sailors to win a world championship title in an Olympic sailing discipline. So there is a lot at stake for Philipp Buhl, who has been sailing the series of his life in the bay bearing his name in Down Under. Will it be his on Sunday?

In the preliminary round, the Allgäuer shocked the competition with 4th, 1st, 1st, 1st, 1st and 2nd places. In the main round, Buhl continued his consistency at the highest level with 2nd, 3rd and 5th places on Saturday. The helmsman from the Norddeutscher Regatta Verein was even able to slightly extend the overall lead he had already taken on the first day. The scenario ahead of the final on Sunday, for which three challenging one-hour races are on the programme again as on Saturday due to a day off, is spectacularly exciting: Buhl leads with just 15 points on his account ahead of the Frenchman Jean Baptiste Bernaz (19 points), who is also performing strongly. However, Bernaz already has a high strike result to his name with an early start, while Buhl has so far scored a fifth place. He is followed by runner-up Matt Wearn (Australia) with 30 points, Great Britain's Elliot Hanson (40 points), Olympic silver medallist Tonci Stipanovic (44 points) from Croatia, Buhl's training partner Jesper Stalheim (47 points) from Sweden and his sailing friend from New Zealand, Olympic bronze medallist Sam Meech (47 points). A second string will be applied after the next race sailed.

With the three scheduled races, a quarter of the regatta is still to come. Everyone knows that: Three race results can change a lot. The good news for Buhl: strong winds are forecast. Although, like all top Laser sailors, his thighs were burning after three hours of top performance and hanging on Saturday evening in Sandringham near Melbourne, these are conditions that suit Buhl - even two days in a row. The 30-year-old, who has won one silver and two bronze medals at the World Championships so far, is trying to distract himself until the showdown. "Today was tough. I've rarely been so tired. But that goes for everyone in the fleet. I would like to take it race by race again on Sunday and block out everything else. Nobody can take what I've done so far away from me. The preliminary round was unique, at least in my sailing history." Buhl knows before the decision: "There are still three races to go and there are still a few people in the game." Buhl's pre-event programme: a hot bath, maybe a film and a chat over tea with Sam Meech. Then the day of the decision can come.

Here to see the results.