Zander and Jesse Kirkland moved up a place in the 49er fleet at the Miami Olympic Class Regatta yesterday.

After nine races they improved to 26th place out of a fleet of 36 boats. Three races were scheduled yesterday on Biscayne Bay and the Bermudian brothers, who are at the beginning of their campaign to qualify for the 2012 Olympics, feel they are starting to get to grips with the high performance skiff.

Their results over the past two days reflect that.

Yesterday they finished 19th and 25th and the best to date, 16th, while on Tuesday they placed 17th, 18th and 28th place. This is after the opening day's finishes of 34th, 22nd and a DNF (did not finish).

Jesse said after Tuesday's racing: "On the whole (it was) probably our best sailing day to date."

Leading the fleet after Wednesday's racing was the French crew of Manu Dyen and Stephane Christidis.

Of Tuesday's racing, Jesse added: "The race committee tucked the race course right up under the Biscayne Bridge which made for a very puffy and shifty course with the 8-12 knot northerly winds. We managed to complete three races, with the wind shifting to the NNE towards the end of the day.

"In the first race, after jostling with the Finns and the top French boat we were able to win the pin – such a great feeling. After holding our lane off the line, we were able to get in phase and hold our own with the top boats. We rounded the top mark in fourth."

But as they got near to the leeward mark, Jesse fell backwards during the final gybe. After a few seconds of barely hanging onto the most back part of the wing/traveller bar, he was able to finagle his way back in the boat.

"The near-catastrophe was thankfully avoided leaving us only losing five boats on the mishap. We ended up finished 17th in the race, but with high spirits after some great moments. The one downside was our rig was too tight resulting in us being noticeably slower than the other top boats."

The second race saw a general recall and with the black flag up, "we were able to successfully fight it out at the boat and come out with another fantastic start.

"Unfortunately, after our great positioning off the line, we found ourselves a little too right, and rounded the windward in 25th. But after some good downwinds and a good second upwind, we finished up 18th.

"In the final race of the day, with the wind shifting right, we again found ourselves battling it out at the boat. We had another good start, and as we attempted to tack and lead the fleet to the right, we fumbled a tack."

The breeze then became more shifty and they finished in 28th spot.

Jesse said: "We had three good starts – two were top five off the line with a good lane. We also had really good downwind legs."

Second overall are the Austrian team of Nico Karth and Nikolaus Resch while in third place are the earlier regatta leaders, Will and Sam Phillips from Australia.

The Kirklands are ahead of three teams from Mexico, three teams from the US, three teams from Canada and the team from Argentina.