JACK Cookson claimed Laser Radial gold for Great Britain at the EUROSAF Youth European Championships in Brest, France after a close battle in the final medal race.

Dorchester's Cookson wasn't the only member of the British team to finish on the podium.

Five medals were won in all, with three of them going to 29er pairings.

Anna Prescott-Eve Townsend, Mimi El-Khazindar-Emma Loveridge, and Daniel Venables and Patrick Keech clinched silver, bronze and silver respectively.

Jenny Cropley and Emma Baker rounded off the British medal haul with 420 silver.

Cookson’s gold adds to his ever-growing summer medal collection – he won bronze at the Laser Radial Youth European Championships earlier this year.

In the medal race in France it was a winner-takes-all clash between Cookson and his two Italian opponents, Gianmarco Planchestainer and Paolo Giargia.

The Brit came out on top in the end, beating the Italians by just one and two points overall.

“My week was really tricky and really tight with the other competitors," said Cookson. "It was nervous trying to get low scores every day.

"It feels really good. It was one of my goals at the start of the year so I’m really happy.

“The week was shifty and really choppy with quite a tidal course. It involved a lot of thinking on your toes.

"My favourite race was probably the medal race, it was the most fun.

"It was really good racing and great to come away with the results I did.”

Cookson and Daniel Whiteley, who finished fifth, will now take a short break before heading out to Kingston, Canada for the Laser Radial Youth World Championships (August 14-20).

Also in the Laser Radial class in France, Karyna Manuel (Grafham Water) ended her week in eighth and Ellie Brown (Beaver SC) was 11th.

Prescott and Townsend (Hayling Island SC) struggled in their windy medal race, but they had done enough work earlier in the week for silver.

"The medal race was so windy, a bit too windy for us, it was different to all the others which were lighter and shiftier which we prefer," said Prescott.

“It’s amazing to win silver and we are really pleased. In the end it was really close and we had a scary last race.”

Townsend continued: “We are very happy, very relieved. This is probably the best racing we have done all year.

"We improved as the week went on, getting two firsts on day four.”

El-Khazindar and Loveridge’s medal race domination, winning by over a minute, was enough to put them on the podium for bronze.