As the Sydney 2000 sailing regatta reaches its closing stages, medal hopes for the Irish competitors have receded in spite of a creditable race-win by David Burrows in the Finn single-hander. The fickle winds around Sydney Harbour are proving decisive between the world's leading crews and the super-elite that are now edging towards the medal ceremony on Saturday evening.

Although the Malahide sailor won his second race of the day yesterday, a 19th earlier saw him actually slip back down the overall placings from 12th to 13th as the first discard kicked into force.

Britain's Iain Percy continues to lead the class while multiple world champion Frederik Loof of Sweden has displaced Mateusz Kusnierewicz of Poland from second to third overall in what has become an open battle for the leader.

In spite of his current standing however, Burrows' result in race six yesterday points towards his capability and the race win cannot be viewed as a chance although he readily admits to luck playing a part in other aspects of the racing.

With this event set to become a high-scoring series, he could still readily achieve a top-six result by Saturday with just 10 points in between. The Star keelboat pairing of Mark Mansfield and David O'Brien picked up some ground in somewhat steadier conditions on the open ocean course yesterday.

The 14-19 knot south-east winds saw the Irish crew score two good results - a seventh and a ninth - to bring them up to 12th overall. Their performance curve will need to improve further if the 15-point gap to the top 10 is to be bridged over the next five races.

Meanwhile, having started out as one of the great Irish medal hopes when the Europe event began a week ago, Maria Coleman scored her second 17th placing yesterday after an 11th earlier to drop to 10th overall.

The Europe class having rested for two days, the Baltimore sailor saw her seventh overall standing crumble yesterday along with any outside hopes of a medal.