Robertson on Olympic target

Sailing

With seven wins from seven starts and the best 10 results from 12 to count, Scotland's Shirley Robertson is all but on the plane to next year's Olympics, writes Stuart Alexander from Weymouth. Having dominated the singlehanded Europe class in the first three days of the Olympic trials here, she was streets ahead again yesterday.

In the men's 470, there is little now to stop the world number ones, John Merricks and Ian Walker, from joining her. They scored two seconds yesterday, enough to stretch away from their nearest rivals, Jason Belben and Paul Brotherton.

The weeding-out has begun in the Soling class, where match-racing is the method of selection. After the first round, Andy Beadsworth and Chris Law top the table with 11 wins apiece.

The real fight is at the top of the Laser class, where the selectors may invoke a provision which allows them not to select the Brut week winner automatically , but to ask for a delay until after further regattas at the start of next season. Two more races yesterday put Ben Ainslie on top, but another half-dozen are pushing hard.