World Championship 49er, FX & Nacra 17: "Highest level of the year", SailGP aces in front

DSV head coach Dom Tidey is not prone to exaggeration. When he reports that the World Championships for 49er, 49erFX and Nacra 17 in Italy are "the highest level of competition that we have seen this year", then we can expect a veritable mega battle. The best in the fast-paced Olympic disciplines 49er, 49erFX and Nacra 17 have gathered on Cagliari's Poetto Beach to determine their world champions.

49er Olympic champions: Botin and Trittel strong

Two days before Sunday's final, it became clear on Friday evening who could be fighting for the titles off the coast of Sardinia. The 49ers' reigning Olympic champions and SailGP title defenders Diego Botin and Florian Trittel are already leading the way. On the fourth and so far most difficult day of the World Championships, the Spaniards, with an outstanding record of 1-5-1, have taken a 24-point lead over three-time world champions Bart Lambriex van Aanholt and Floris van de Werken. Click here for the intermediate results of the 49er men's skiff world championship.

Germany's top performers in the 49er, Richard Schultheis and Fabian Rieger (Norddeutscher Regatta Verein/Verein Seglerhaus am Wannsee), struggled on Friday. They finished twelfth three times in a light wind race and two heats in unstable twelve to 15 knots of wind. Fabian Rieger described the conditions as "tricky". His assessment of Friday: "We managed to get through the day a bit. We made a mistake here and there, which cost us a lot because mistakes are quickly penalised in the Goldfleet."

The wind should actually be quite solid over the next few days. We'll go full throttle again." Fabian Rieger

New dream team at the start - that's how strong Schultheis/Rieger started their first season together.

With 80 points on their skiff World Championship account, Richard Schultheis and Fabian Rieger are only nine points behind the Poles Mikolaj Staniul and Jakub Sztorch. Three more Goldfleet races could be held on Friday. The final in the new format is to take place on Sunday: In the end, the new 4-point race with the best four crews will be the deciding factor in determining the world champions.

New final format for 49er, FX and Nacra 17

The premiere of the new final format was preceded by intensive discussions within the class association. And they continue. There is a fierce tug-of-war between those who want to include as many race results as possible to maximise fairness in the Olympic sport of sailing, which is heavily influenced by the elements. However, with the strong dominance of exceptional athletes, it could and can happen that Olympic champions are already determined before the medal race.

The IOC, TV broadcasters and sports marketers, on the other hand, are less happy about this. For maximum telegenicity, excitement and the "golden Olympic moment", they want predictable broadcast times and, above all, thrilling decisions only in the last heat. In the struggle for a format that satisfies all needs, a new mix is now being served up at the World Championships for 49er, 49erFX and Nacra 17, the effect and success of which remains to be seen.

And this is how it should go: The final day opens with a so-called "Gold Fleet Umpired Race", which is contested by the best 20 teams in the 49er, 49erFX and Nacra 17 after the fleet races. The four best teams then move on to the "4-point final". Important: The team with the most points after the "Gold Fleet Umpired Race" will take three points into the deciding race, the second-placed team two points, the third-placed team one point and the fourth-placed team zero points.

How the 4-point final works

In the only final run - the "4-point final" - only the winning team receives four points, all others zero points. With four teams and three medals, two principles apply in the final race: Anyone can still win gold. And: any team that is beaten in the final run by a team placed behind them after the fleet races can only move down one place.

Even the new system cannot prevent sporting imbalances such as the Olympic drama of the British iQFoil top surfer Emma Wilson, who started the Olympic medal final in Marseille with an incredible 31-point lead after a dominant performance, but unfortunately finished third in the final and only got bronze instead of the gold everyone deserved. Even in the new final format, dominant serial winners can be caught out by unfortunate circumstances in the battle for gold and robbed of their previously strong record.

It remains exciting to see how the experiment will turn out at this World Championship for skiffs and Nacra 17s and how it will be assessed by all those involved afterwards. Sophie Steinlein, eleventh after eleven races before the final weekend with her foresailor Catherine Bartelheimer, said of the new format: "I think the race with the 20 crews is relatively superfluous, but they want to test it because of the small fields at the Olympic Games. I think the format for the top four is relatively good. I think it gives the media enough, but it's still relatively fair for the athletes. You can drop a place..."

Skiff World Championships: the area demands a lot

Sophie Steinlein and Catherine Bartelheimer (Norddeutscher Regatta Verein/Bayerischer Yacht-Club/Segelclub Inning am Ammersee) and their team-mates have been racing in the gold fleet in the Sardinian World Championship area since Friday until Sunday's double final. Dom Tidey described the venue as "exceptionally challenging".

The Head Coach is in Sardinia with the German Sailing Team. According to Tidey, the conditions "put the sailors' skills to the test in every respect". The Brit continued: "Even the qualifying rounds were characterised by a fickle sea breeze that kept surprising the teams and changing unpredictably just when they thought they had understood the conditions."

Speaking specifically about Friday's conditions, Dom Tidey said: "The first Gold Fleet races on Friday brought with them a new weather system that made for very changeable and volatile conditions across the race course. The race organisers were forced to cancel and restart the races during the course of the day due to the fluctuating conditions." Good nerves and good judgement were also required.

Three German 49erFX crews in the top 20

This was true in the 49er as well as in the Nacra 17 field, where Josh Berktold and Zoe Coers were the only German starters in 28th place after a total of twelve races among 40 teams in the silver fleet, as well as in the women's 49erFX. At the top, Olympic silver medallist Vilma Bobeck and her new foresailor Ebba Berntsson have secured a small cushion of five points with 47 points ahead of the Canadian sisters Georgia and Antonia Lewin-Lafrance, who have been sailing strongly this season.

Sophie Steinlein and Catherine Bartelheimer will start on Saturday in eleventh place with 82 points on their Skiff World Championship account. Four races are planned for the 49erFX women. In 15th place, SailGP strategist Anna Barth and Emma Kohlhoff (Kieler Yacht-Club) with 94 points are fighting to catch up with the top ten, who were 15 points away on Friday evening.

Maru Scheel and Freya Feilcke from the Kieler Yacht-Club had placed 19th. Olympic sixth-placed Marla Bergmann and Hanna Wille (Mühlenberger Segel-Club) were in 27th place before the final weekend, one place behind their team-mates Katharina Schwachhofer and Elene Stoltze (Württembergischer Yacht-Club/Segelkameradschaft Leopoldshafen).

Double Olympic champions only in 20th place

Other top crews are also struggling in the 49erFX in the Italian world championship area. In one boat, the double Olympic champions Martine Grael and Kahena Kuntze - one as helmswoman, the other as strategist also active in the SailGP - initially only found themselves in 20th place before the showdown at the weekend. The Brazilians will probably not leave it at that. Click here for the women's 49erFX Skiff World Championship intermediate classification.