Three more races were completed under blue skies and a shifty 8-12 knot north-easterly on day two of the 49er European championship in Grimstad, Norway yesterday.

RYA team GBR sailors Chris Draper/Simon Hiscocks, who brought home the silver medal from the world championship in Hawaii in June, posted another good day, scoring a second, third and their second bullet of the championship. This gives them the most consistent score line out of all the competitors and places them in third place overall, but on equal points with Norwegians Christoffer Sundby and Frode Bovim who are in second place.

Fellow team GBR sailors and bronze medallists at the worlds, Paul Brotherton/Mark Asquith, mirrored Draper/Hiscocks results, also scoring a 2,3,1 moves them up into fourth place overall after being able to discard their worst result, a 12th place.

Alister Richardson/Peter Greenhalgh scored their first race win of the championship in the first race, and added to it a sixth and a 16th, to put them in 12th place overall.

The defending European champions, Michael Hestbaek and Rasmus Terp van Hansen of Demark, currently hold a slender lead over the 88-strong pack. The competitors have one more day of qualifying before going into gold, silver and bronze fleets to sail the final series, with the European champions being decided on Friday.

Results (provisional pending protests)

1, Michael Hestbaek/Rasmus Terp van Hansen, DEN (1,4,1,(6),2,1) 9 pts

2, Christoffer SundbySundby/Frode Bovim, NOR ((BFD),2,1,1,4,2) 10 pts

3, Chris Draper/Simon Hiscocks, GBR (1,(3),3,2,3,1) 10 pts

Other GBR

4, Paul Brotherton/Mark Asquith (3,2,(12),2,3,1) 18 pts

12, Alister Richardson/Peter Greenhalgh(10,2,4,1,6,(16)) 23 pts

35, Steve Morrison/Ben Rhodes (9,9,(10),10,5,9) 42 pts

40, Alex Hopson/Phil Kennard (8,3,10,15,(16),8) 44 pts

41, Andy Rice/Harvey Hillary (10,14,3,13,(15),5) 45 pts