ALISON Young brought the curtain down on her maiden Olympic campaign with fourth in the Laser Radial medal race.

The Worcestershire sailor, who finished fifth overall, has vowed to learn from her mistakes in Weymouth as she sets her sights on Rio 2016.

In the 11th and final race of the London 2012 regatta on the Nothe course, Young’s medal hopes were already extinguished due to an 18-point gap to the two boats in joint third.

She finished behind three of the four boats in the medal contest as China’s Xu Lijia took gold, Marit Bouwmeester from Holland silver and Belgian Evi van Acker bronze.

Young was third overall after five races last week but a black-flag disqualification in outing nine effectively ended her charge. However, she has vowed to build on the experience.

“It has definitely given me a taste for the future – I will be carrying on to Rio and there have been lots of lessons learned that we can work on to get a medal,” said Young.

“I was close but there were too many accumulated mistakes through the week. I’m the one holding the stick so they were my decisions but it has been a great experience. Having won a medal at the Sail for Gold regatta in Weymouth in June, I didn’t see any reason why I couldn’t do that again so that was the aim. I’m disappointed with fifth but have learned lots for the future.

“It was great racing in the middle of a four-way battle for medals and was tight all the way around but I was just focusing on my own race rather than worrying about whether I was messing anyone else up.”

Young, of Bewdley, prepared for her finale by watching British team-mates Iain Percy and Andrew Simpson win silver in the Star class and Ben Ainslie grab another gold in the Finn.

“It was a great experience to race on the Nothe in the medal race,” she added. “The support was fantastic and gives you a boost to go out there and try your best.”

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