Hopes are riding high in the GBR Challenge team this week after they posted a superb victory over Denis Conner's Stars and Stripes.

The Brits' win came in the second Round Robin to move them up to equal third place.

Lying in fourth after the first round, they came in 46 seconds ahead of the American boat to record their fourth consecutive win in the competition.

The first attempt at racing was cancelled when the wind died but it restarted in an eight-knot breeze and, as the start gun went, both Wight Lightning, the GBR boat, and Stars and Stripes came into the start box and immediately bore away.

As the American boat, USA 66, passed beneath the British team, starting helmsman Andy Beadsworth, the Hampshire yachtsman, gybed to follow.

Team Dennis Conner headed out to the right hand side of the course, before gybing, with GBR gybing inside them with two minutes remaining.

As the boats sailed back towards the line, the teams had to bear away to avoid being early for the gun. GBR headed up to take the pin end as the gun was fired with Stars and Stripes just behind to windward.

The American team immediately sailed higher than GBR 70, to establish an early advantage and gain control of the right hand side of the course.

They then benefited from a huge shift that tripled their lead and USA 66 rounded the first mark of the course one minute and six seconds ahead.

On the downwind leg, it was neck and neck but two thirds of the way down the run, tactician Ado Stead called for GBR 70 to gybe to the right hand side of the course, a move which Conner's men did not match, cutting their lead to a mere boat length.

By the leeward mark, the British team had taken one minute and twenty three seconds out of Stars and Stripes to establish a 17-second lead but the American veterans started a tacking duel, starting with a dummy tack that Ian Walker matched.

GBR Challenge maintained their advantage and increased their lead when USA 66 virtually stalled, trying to carry out all these manoeuvres in the light wind conditions.

They recaptured the lead briefly but gybing for the final mark on port, they illegally forced the British team to alter course and the umpires awarded a red flag penalty that gave the lead back to GBR 70 as USA 66 carried out their turn.