Goodison endures tough day's qualifying at World Championships

OLYMPIC gold medallist Paul Goodison slipped from second to fourth on a difficult day's qualifying at the Laser World Championships at Hayling Island.

TOUGH DAY: Defending champion Paul Goodison has slipped from second to fourth after a difficult day's qualifying at Hayling Island

Goodison, the defending world champion could only manage ninth place in his first outing of the day - the third of six qualifying races - but bounced back to finish fourth in his next race.

He has a total of 17 points but that is trimmed to eight when his ninth place is discarded and puts him in fourth place overall - three behind Luka Radelic of Croatia.

"It was a really tough day," he said. "It was light with a fickle sea breeze which came in from the south east.

"I just got on the wrong side of a couple of big things on the first race but I came back quite well to finish in the top ten so I was happy with that.

"In the second race I was more in it. At the moment it is about trying not to use up the discard too early. It would have been easy to get caught out on the wrong side today, and not easy to get back, so keeping in single figures for me is good."  

In second place with six points was New Zealand's Joshua Junior, first and second on Tuesday, with first-day leader Michael Bullot down in third.

Great Britain's Nick Thompson is currently in sixth place on 11 points after a difficult day saw him come home 25th and sixth.

Meanwhile, Olympic bronze medallist Bryony Shaw is ninth after five qualifying races at the RS:X World Championships in Kerteminde, Denmark - the same position occupied by defending champion Nick Dempsey in the men's competition after six races.