West Mersea sailor Hannah Stodel will head into the final day of the Para World Sailing Championships in Melbourne in pole position for a gold medal.

Stodel, along with John Robertson and Steve Thomas, are part of the British Sonar trio who are in the overall lead at the event, with one day and one race of the regatta remaining.

The two-time world champions claimed a second and a race win yesterday.

And that, along with a disappointing 13,10 for the Australian series leaders, ensures they head into the final day with a four-point advantage.

Stodel and her crew-mates will fight it out for the podium spots in tomorrow’s final race, with the Australian crew and the French defending champions tied on points just behind them.

Stodel said: “Given the venue and what we’ve seen, the scores have been so up and down I think we’ll just play nice and steady, casual, just go out and enjoy the race and see what happens.

“We won’t be playing any silly shenanigans that’s for sure.”

Stodel was pleased that they could put a disappointing fourth day on Tuesday, where the trio posted a sixth and a 14th, behind them.

She added: “After yesterday we took ourselves off, we had a Chinese, we had a discussion and we sailed a lot better today, so we’re pretty happy.

“Yesterday we talked ourselves out of the game. We let it get to us and today we gave ourselves a good stiff talking to.

“The breeze was up again today which is one of our favoured conditions and I think we proved we can sail quite well in these.

“I think we’re just maybe a bit more physical than everybody else on the boat.

“Our fitness comes into play here. Even just getting the Canadians on the line in the second race was just down to sheer brute force and sending it home.

“We were pretty aggressive out there and I think that’s helped a bit.”