Irish sailing has reached new heights this week following the release of the World Rankings list by the International Sailing Federation that covers the various Olympic classes. Two Irish sailors - one male, one female - have reached the top 10 in their respective classes with over a year to go before the Sydney 2000 Olympics.

Maria Coleman from Baltimore in West Cork, who is ranked eighth, had already been listed in the top 10 so is putting in continued consistent performances. Now she has been joined by Malahide's David Burrows who has moved from 11th to eighth following his results from Kiel Week in late June where the Irish Finn nomination was decided.

The ISAF rankings paint a very broad picture of each of the classes as they cover a period dating back to last year. The narrower Eurolymp rankings concentrate on events staged since early spring and show Burrows, along with John Driscoll, his main rival for the Irish nomination, in fifth and sixth place overall.

However, it is the world governing body rankings that are accepted by the Sports Council for the purposes of funding. Coleman is now joined by Burrows at World Class Two level and the Irish Sailing Association will now be making an application on his behalf for increased support. World Class One level applies to athletes who reach the top three world rankings in any discipline.

Meanwhile, Olympic veteran Mark Mansfield has stepped up the pace of his campaign to attend his third games in the Star class keelboat. The Cork yachtsman was joined by former Fireball European and world champion David O'Brien earlier this summer in a prospective link-up for a full Star campaign.

Mansfield and O'Brien headed off to Austria for the Spring European Championship and finished 11th in a fleet of 65 boats. As the event was a Grade One ISAF regatta, this became their first qualifying result for the class.

The pair depart for Boston this weekend for the class North American Championship where they hope to achieve the second qualifying result. With the campaign underway, Eagle Star have now come on board as their main sponsor while performance bonuses and coaching grants from the ISA have also started flowing. Next on the programme for the pair will be the Italian nationals at the end of August followed by the World Championships at Punta Ala. "It'd be a bit optimistic for us to say that we'll certainly qualify for the class in Italy this year," Mansfield told The Irish Times yesterday. "We plan to begin an intensive series of regattas and training from January of next year straight into the games."

Mansfield pointed out that the class is not like the other Olympic dinghy classes where a lot of students and younger people are sailing and can take time out. "Star sailors tend to have families, careers and jobs and can't take the same time out to race full-time," he said. "We would not be dissimilar to 90 per cent of other countries in that respect."

For the Sydney Games, the number of entries for the class has been trimmed from 26 in 1996 to just 15 for 2000. However, having ended 12th overall in Savannah three years ago and believing they should have done better, Mansfield doesn't foresee difficulty making the cut this time round either.