Gilmour recovers to secure record fourth win

The old master, Peter Gilmour, back on top form and back on his own home water, gave the match racing game's newest hot shot, Dean Barker of New Zealand, a lesson in skill and determination yesterday when he won the Australia Cup, for a record fourth time.

But it had taken a big-hearted gesture from Barker to allow Gilmour to come back from being 2-0 down in the best of five. Racing was due to stop at noon yesterday, when Barker was ahead. But the man, who at the start of last month hoisted the America's Cup jointly with Russell Coutts, agreed to an extension of racing to let the programme be completed.

That gave Gilmour the chance to exploit the shifting winds in Maltida Bay, off the Royal Perth Yacht Club, and recover to win 3-2. He took control in all the pre-start tussles and then kept it throughout the short, sharp races. Barker goes on to Los Angeles for the Congressional Cup next week.

The all-French play-off for third place went to the locally based exile from Toulon, Sebastien Destremau, as Bertrand Pace, winner of the opening grand prix in the Swedish Match series, the Steinlager Cup, had an off day.

Pace, too, goes on to the Congressional Cup but, although he will be qualified in the rankings, his presence at the World Championship in Croatia next month is in doubt. The International Sailing Federation (ISAF) has rules that crews must all be of the same nationality and Pace's tactician - as he was during the America's Cup - is Marcel van Triest of the Netherlands. Most crews are multinational, so a strict interpretation by the ISAF could see many top skippers declining to take part. Gilmour, for instance, has three Japanese in his crew.