Zander Kirkland knows he has his work cut out for him when he takes to the water in the Laser World Championships this week.

The regatta takes place at the Hyannis Yacht Club, in Cape Cod, Massachusetts from tomorrow and the Bermudian will be up against the cream of the crop.

There are two races each day and all the top 30 ISAF world ranked sailors are entered, barring Dane Anders Nyholm Pederson.

Not only are the sailors competing for the world title, 14 of them will also be trying to qualify their nation for the 2004 Olympic regatta in the open single-handed dinghy event. Five times world champion, two time Olympic medallist and 2001 ISAF Rolex World Sailor of the Year, Robert Scheidt of Brazil will be there looking for another title.

“The worlds will be intense,” said the 19-year-old. “There are handfuls of any one nation's Laser sailors, not just one like at the Olympics.

“I am there for development and I thank (local sailors) Malcolm Smith and Martin Vezina, who finished ahead of me last year in the qualifier, for enabling me to go.”

Kirkland said the forecast for the opening race was for 20 to 25 knots of wind, which he described as “extreme”.

“I am still light but my fitness level is high,” he said. “I know what I need to work on.”

The sailor said he would be focusing on his acceleration off the line and his tactical position downwind.

“At the Europeans I was in good shape at the weather mark half the time but lost many boats downwind,” he said. “It's tough because you are not rounding in a line but in a huge pack. Then they are right behind you, angling off in all directions.”

Kirkland said he still needed to properly familiarise himself with the Laser.

“I find that I am having to think so much about trying to keep up speed-wise that I am not concentrating as much on tactics, so I have been making little errors that cost,” he said.

Kirkland said he hoped to get some coaching at the regatta from the Croatian camp who he described as “a growing sailing power”.