Jochen Schumann wins world sailor of the year award

Sailing

Jochen Schumann, the three-times Olympic gold medallist from Germany, has won the world sailor of the year award. The women's award went to Hong Kong'a Lai Shan Lee, winner of the first and last sailing gold for the colony in the windsurfer class at Savannah. The 1995 winner, Russell Coutts, received the Oegaa achievement award for this year's clean sweep on the match racing circuit.

Tony Bullimore was back in Les Sables d'Olonne 48 hours after the start of the Vendee Globe single-handed round the world race to repair his newly installed and more powerful autopilot, but expected to be back at sea overnight. Isabelle Autissier, of France, leads with Britain's Pete Goss lying eighth.

A high-performance dinghy will be included in the 2000 Olympics following a vote by the council of the International Sailing Federation at its annual general meeting in Brighton yesterday.