The finals of three Olympic sailing races will be tense due to the Mediterranean wind. Both the women's and men's medal race in the dinghy class have been pushed to Wednesday when the officials also hope to finish the mixed multihulls and dinghies.

On Tuesday some racing was possible. The multihulls completed their pre-medal series, and the mixed dinghies got most of them in difficult conditions.

In the lead-up to the Thursday Finals, kiteboarders have also completed more races despite the delays.

Officials flew the flags to indicate that the medal races had already been completed before the race began.

Marit Bouwmeester from the Netherlands, and Anne-Marie Rindom of Denmark had already decided on gold and silver for women's events. Only bronze was left to decide.

Matt Wearn, an Australian sailor, is now set to compete in a'match-race' with Pavlos Kontides of Cyprus, who has the sole chance to beat him.

Stefano Peschiera from Peru and Britain’s Micky Bechtett are third and fourth. Both can challenge Kontides to win silver, if Kontides is pushed further down in the fleet.

Mateo Ajdalani of Argentina and Eugenia Borsco, from New Zealand are chasing after them to win gold. Meanwhile, Britain and New Zealand still have silver and bronze in contention.

Micah Wilkinson, a New Zealander, said: "There's three boats with two spots. We'll fight it out."

John Gimson, a British man, and Anna Burnet from Britain, who will be married in a month's time, have said that they are going to focus on their individual strategy.

It's a really difficult race... Burnet said, "I don't believe you can do more than focus on the specifics and execute your own plan."

Austria is also battling to keep Spain, Japan, and Sweden at bay in the mixed dinghies.

Austrian Lara Vadlau said, "We're confident that we can be fast. We just need to think smart."

Lukas Maehr, her crew member, said: "It'll be fascinating to watch and sail."

Some sailors' Olympic journeys may have ended.

Chris Grube, a British Olympic veteran said with a smile that he didn't think it would happen again. He did not completely rule out rerunning the race. Reporting by Alexander Smith, Editing by Ed Osmond

(source: Reuters)