Design World Championships title last week.

Bromby, sailing with a crew of Mickey Cox, Mick Finnegan, Kevin Horsefield and Peter Watt, needed to beat American Bruce Dyson by two clear spots in the final race in Helensburgh, Glasgow, to win the competition.

In the event, while Bromby finished third, Dyson managed to keep him in his sights well enough to finish fourth and clinch first place in the seven-race series by the slender margin of 0.9 points.

But there was some consolation for the Bermudian who described the climax as "one of the most thrilling fleet races I've been involved in''.

In the final analysis though, he was left cursing his luck, particularly in the fourth race of the series in which he suffered a breakdown.

"That effectively cost us the regatta,'' he said yesterday on his return to the Island.

Overall, though, he was happy with the performance at the week-long regatta, which saw another former three-time champion, Bermuda's Penny Simmons, finish seventh in the ten-boat fleet.

"I felt we sailed quite well,'' said Bromby, " but we were a little short-changed in the luck department.

"A couple of times Dyson was seventh on the final windward leg and he took a long shot and finished up second and fourth. Sometimes you just have to roll the dice and it came up trumps for him.'' Some had chosen to focus on the battle between the two Bermudian former winners, but Bromby said that was never uppermost in his mind.

"It wasn't so much about us trying to beat each other, it was more about both of us trying to win the same event against nine other boats. It was not a case of us going head-to-head to win.'' Bromby now turns his attention to the Star European Championships in Germany in a week's time.

There, he'll be teaming up with Olympic partner Lee White for the first time since Atlanta in 1996 as he builds up to the Worlds in Slovenia in September.