After seven hours on the water yesterday and two races sailed, Michael Fellmann of Germany took the lead at the Finn European Championship, Turkey, on day three, four points ahead of Luca Devoti of Italy.

The German scored a fifth and a second in two tricky races in a medium pressure and shifty wind. Italian Devoti, started badly on the second race of the day to finish in fifteenth position after finishing second in the first race of the day.

After two hours on the water waiting for the wind to settle, racing got underway with the first race of the day being won by Croatian Karlo Kuret. RYA team GBR sailor Andrew Simpson finished in seventh place with team mate Ben Ainslie in ninth, and Charlie Cumbley one place behind in 10th.

2001 European Champion Emilios Papathanasiou of Greece won the afternoon race. He sailed a good race and chose the right-hand side of the beat, which paid off. Papathanasiou increased his lead on the run to win the race with a good margin. Fellman took second in front of Mateusz Kusznierewicz of Poland.

Chris Brittle had the best second race out of the Brits, scoring an eighth place, with Cumbley and Simpson in 19th and 20th place respectively. Ben Ainslie didn’t have the best second race of the day, collecting a yellow flag for pumping; he finished in fourth place but was later disqualified.

One race is scheduled today (Thursday) with the championship finishing on Saturday.

Results (after day three)

1, Michael Fellmann, GER ((11),1,2,5,2) 10 pts

2, Luca Devoti, ITA (6,2,4,2,(15)) 14 pts

3, Karlo Kuret, CRO (3,(9),8,1,6) 18 pts

RYA Team GBR

5, Ben Ainslie, GBR (4,8,1,9,(DSQ)) 22 pts

10, Andrew Simpson (5,12,(BFD),7,20) 44 pts

14, Charlie Cumbley (17,15,17,10,(19)) 59 pts

29, Chris Brittle (19, DNE,(27),15,8) 106 pts