Perth Catholic Kylie Forth performed admirably in the Blind Sailing World Championships recently in Japan, with her Australian team finishing second.
The B1 class event was won by Great Britain, despite a fast-finishing Australian team narrowing the gap in the final races.
The event consisted of 15 races over five days, with points scored for each race and the overall leader taking home the trophy.
Australia started slowly and after seven races was languishing at the bottom of the table.
However, a strong performance on days three and four, in which Ms Forth’s team came either first or second in every race, helped Australia to gain second position.
Ms Forth said it was the team’s slow start to the competition that cost them first place.
“We started quite badly,” she said.
“We amped up the concentration and managed to pull a few really good races out of somewhere.”
The Claremont parishioner, who was the team’s skipper, received the media’s choice award for the best sailor in the championships.
Nineteen teams from six countries took part in the championships, which were held from May 26 to June 1.
The second place finish replicates the team’s effort in last year’s match-racing championship.
“Great Britain were by far the best sailors and we were matching them,” Ms Forth said.
“We would have loved to have beaten them, but next year we will.”
Ms Forth said the team was far stronger this year than at the previous fleet-racing championships in 2009, when Australia finished 6th.
The team will now begin preparation for the world match-racing championship to be held in Boston next year.
Ms Forth said she was confident Australia would enter two teams in next year’s event.