FINN Hawkins wants to bottle the confidence gained from a stellar showing at the World Championships to power him to Olympic glory in four years’ time, writes James Reid of Sportsbeat.

The 21-year-old was the pick of the British men in Lanzarote thanks to a 12th-place finish in the iQFOiL class, with the Cornish sailor narrowly missing out on the medal race.

And the Under-21 world champion is determined to continue on improving, with a place at the Los Angeles 2028 Games the ultimate prize.

“I had a lot of confidence this week,” he said. “I had some really good results and proved to myself I can race at the very front of a fleet in world championships, but I still have a little way to go in building consistency and not getting the bad results as well.

“It’s an improvement from the past world championships and this was always going to be the hardest one of the past four years. I was gutted to miss out on the medal race but I was still happy with where I placed. I feel like I am improving and so overall I am happy.

“Hopefully I can continue the upward trend from here going into the next cycle. I will definitely be looking to give it a go for the Olympics in Los Angeles 2028. If I continue to improve and keep climbing up the ladder, hopefully I will be in with a shot at the next one.”

Los Angeles is the aim for Hawkins with British selection for the Paris Games already sewn up ahead of the world championships despite several other nations using the results to help determine their picks.

Great Britain will be represented by Sam Sills in Marseille this summer, and while Hawkins revelled in the lack of pressure this time around, he hopes a healthy rivalry between British sailors can continue to drive up standards.

“It’s actually really important to be collaborative with your team, especially in the lead up [to a Games],” he added.

“There is some good youths and under-21 guys coming up who will definitely be up there by the time the next one comes.

“The Olympic selection for us is over and the pressure was on for a lot of other nations, so it was a really good event for me to just learn as much as I can about racing people at high pressure.

“I could have kept my head a bit clearer as the result didn’t mean as much as other world championships.”

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