After suffering two disqualifications for starting faults earlier in the week, the 47-year-old went into the final race of the 11 overall nine points behind home hope Lucas and chasing the unlikely goal of beating her by at least eight boats as well as finishing in the top five.

However with Lucas only managing to end up 21st Berlin's second placed finish was enough to do exactly that and win overall by a mere two points.

Lucas did hang on for silver ahead of British teammate Megan Pascoe who was rewarded for a consistent series with her second consecutive world championship bronze.

There was no doubt who the star of the day was however and in addition to his seven victories Berlin has now won twelve world championship medals in just thirteen events.

Stellen Berlin of Sweden taking a celebratory dunk after securing his seventh world title in Poole


"I was very happy and relieved when I found out I won gold!" admitted the Swede afterwards.

"I was aware I could have still lost silver and I figured the chances of gold were so small that the primary goal was to try to keep the silver.

"But it turned around that there were possibilities that changed the game a little bit.

"It's been a hard struggle all the way, and it's been very tight at the top so I'm very happy with the outcome."

On the other hand Lucas was understandably "completely gutted" to have in her words "clutched defeat from the jaws of victory."

She did however admit that the week had been a productive in terms of being a learning process ahead of her foremost goal of the Rio Paralympicc Games in 2016.

Lucas, who in Berlin's absence already has one gold medal from London 2012, will have a good chance to gain revenge on the Swede at next year's world championships to be held at the Toronto National Yacht Club in Canada.

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