Defending champion Johnie Berntsson soared to the top of the Bermuda Gold Cup leaderboard after a flawless day in Hamilton Harbour.

After a disappointing opening session, in which he won only one race, Berntsson won all four of his races on day two to head the standings alongside Swiss skipper Eric Monnin.

Berntsson picked up wins against Ian Garreta, Nick Egnot-Johnson and Ian Williams, but it was his victory against Chris Poole that caught the eye with both sailors picking up penalties in a race packed with incident.

After penalties were handed out at the start, the lead changed hands on a number of occasions, with Berntsson delighted to have come out on top of a fierce battle.

“It was two penalties each and good, fun racing,” Berntsson said.

“In the dial-up at the pre-start, he hit our stern and got a penalty. After that he got an overtake, which we thought he might have had a red flag for, but then we got a penalty and one we didn’t agree with the umpire about.

“We gained after the start, passed him and they came back at the second upwind mark and locked us up. Then we overtook him and did a gyb and he got a penalty.”

From being one of the back markers at the start of the day, Berntsson has passed almost the entire field in the space of four flights.

“We saw that the conditions were the same as the other day and we really fought hard at the start today to give our opponents some penalties,” he said.

“We managed to keep the boat speed up and were good at picking the important shifts as it was very shifty out there.”

But it is tight at the top with six sailors within a win of each other at the halfway stage of the round robin. Garetta is one of four sailors alongside Ian Williams, Peter Wickwire and Chris Poole with four wins and he claimed the scalp of Congressional Cup winner Monnin in his final race of the day.

“Eric is always strong in these boat and in these conditions,” he said.

“We started really well, won the start and he picked up a penalty. We didn’t make a really good first upwind and he got back in front but we made a good choice of the downwind gate and managed to pass him again.”

The French skipper has picked up a couple of wins on each day of racing to be in the mix with far more experienced sailors and he is happy with how things are progressing,

“If the percentage is 50-50 or above then it’s a good day for us,” Garreta said.

“Today, we were better in the pre-start but we had trouble with the wind early, so it was really tricky. The road is still long and the second round robin will be tense. I may be one win behind the leaders but there are a lot of us there, so nothing is decided yet.”

With seven races down and seven to go there is plenty of time for things to change with only the top four sailors after the round robin stage progressing to the semi-finals.