Olympic sailor Alison Young is set to embark on her ‘second most important regatta of the year’ as she prepares to race at the Laser Radial World Championships in Vallarta, Mexico, this week (14-20 April).

Bewdley’s Young is using the seven-day regatta to fine-tune her preparations towards Rio 2016 and what will be her second Olympic Games outing in the women’s one person dinghy event, having finished fifth at London 2012.

Young, currently ranked fifth in the world, will be among 72 sailors from 32 nations set to contest the World Championships event, which she sees as a key stepping stone towards Rio success.

“It’s the second most important regatta of the year, but we’re using it to refine a few processes,” the 28-year-old explained.

“The pressure’s going to be on in the fleet so we’ll be able to see how some of the processes we’ve been working on stand up, and where we need to make adjustments in the next few months.”

Among Young’s key rivals for the World Championship crown will be the Netherlands’ world number one and European Champion Marit Bouwmeester, defending titleholder Anne-Marie Rindom of Denmark and China’s Olympic gold medallist Lijia Xu.

“Frustratingly I’ve been missing the medals at the last few regattas with a few fourths and fifths, so we’ve just got to keep chipping away to get onto the podium,” continued Young, who’s racing for the first time at the regatta venue which will also host the Laser Standard Worlds next month.

“I’ve not been to Mexico before this but from talking to some people that have I’m expecting a sea breeze venue so anything from kind of 8-12 knots, maybe more, and with a bit of sea state as well so it should make for some good, close racing.”

British Sailing Team Podium Potential sailor Georgina Povall will be joining Young at the Vallarta event, which will see up to 14 races staged across the seven day series.

Competition will commence on Thursday 14 April with two races planned per day, weather permitting, through until Wednesday 20 April. Results will be available at http://laserworlds2016.org/

Meanwhile, British crews have seen a steady start to competition at the 49er and 49erFX European Championships in Barcelona with Rio-bound duo Charlotte Dobson-Sophie Ainsworth in third place in the 49erFX fleet after two days of the six-day regatta.

In the 49er men’s event, John Pink-Stuart Bithell are also third after two days of racing in the 49er men’s fleet, with James Peters-Fynn Sterritt in seventh.

The final medal races are scheduled for Saturday 16 April. Results are available at http://49er.org/2016-european-championship/

We’ll bring you updates from both regattas on the British Sailing Team’s Facebook page and on Twitter @BritishSailing.