Sailing: Pair claim 18th regatta win on end

Tauranga sailor Peter Burling, right, and Blair Tuke have defended their 49er world title in France.

Tauranga's Peter Burling is once again on top of the sailing world.

The remarkable sailing partnership of Burling, 24, and Blair Tuke, 25, produced more silverware as they defended their 49er title at the ISAF Sailing World Cup Hyeres Regatta in France.

It was their 18th successive regatta win and came with a day to spare.

They went into the final races overnight with an unassailable 45-point lead over their fiercest rivals, Australian's Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen, who beat Burling and Tuke to gold at the 2012 London Olympics.

Burling and Tuke clinched the title with a second and a win on the penultimate day of the regatta held in challenging conditions.

Team New Zealand helmsman Burling and crewman Tuke put aside all the recent turmoil over whether their America's Cup dreams may be scuppered or not with a typically accurate performance yesterday.

Burling was humble after an impressive display of tactically superior match racing.

"We were stoked to get a couple of good solid ones to begin with today and then have it done before the last race," Burling said.

"Everybody else has definitely improved as well. It's probably a lot tighter out there than the scoreboard shows."

Burling was not the only Tauranga Yacht and Power Boat sailor to impress in France.

Molly Meech and her Auckland partner Alexandra Maloney have an outside chance of medals. They go into the 49erFX medal race in eighth place after sailing four races for finishes of 18th, 15th, fifth and 11th to move one place up the leader board.

A good final day could see them sneak into medal contention.

In the Nacra 17, Tauranga's Jason Saunders and Aucklander Gemma Jones sailed well in the breezy conditions but it was not enough to break into the top 10. The New Zealand's mixed multihull pair finished the regatta in 14th place.

In the highly competitive Laser field, Tauranga pair Thomas Saunders and Sam Meech finished within the top half of the invitation-only fleet featuring the world's best Olympic class Laser sailors. Saunders was 12th and Meech finished 14th.

Andrew Murdoch finished strongly in the Finn class with a sixth and an eighth in his final two races but was hampered by gear damage earlier. He was 12th overall.