Star sailors Hamish Pepper and Carl Williams climbed to fourth to be New Zealand's best-placed crew after an eventful day at the world yachting championships in Portugal yesterday.
Frustrated by currents and the inconsistent breeze off Cascais, the Star fleet sailed only one race to kick off theirfinals series.
Defending world champions Pepper and Williams finished second to climb two places from sixth overall.
The news wasn't so bright for the other New Zealand Star crew, when helm Rohan Lord suffered a dislocated knee during the race.
The inner courses once again had patchy and shifty winds, but it was different on the outer courses, which had gusts of more than 30 knots.
Sharon Ferris and her Yngling crew had two contrasting results in the strong conditions to hold on to sixth place overall.
They capsized in the first of two races while lying fourth, but saved the boat from sinking and eventually finished under jib in 29th place.
Incredibly, Ferris, Raynor Smeal and Shandy Buckley recovered to win the second race and stay on course for the top-10 finish needed to qualify a New Zealand crew at next year's Olympics.
Dan Slater was third and 13th in the Finn class to improve five places to 18th overall.
RS:X boardsailors were reduced to one race due to a lack of breeze, with Barbara Kendall ninth in the challenging conditions and improving to 20th overall in a women's fleet of 73.
Tom Ashley and Jon-Paul Tobin fell to 21st and 39th among the men.
