Great Britain's Olympic gold medal winner Shirley Robertson has been named female sailor of the year by the International Sailing Federation.

The honour was announced at the Sheraton Grand Hotel in Edinburgh where 350 people from 60 nations gathered to honour the leading sailors of the year.

Robertson won gold in the Europe class after narrowly missing out on a medal in Atlanta.

The male award went to Mark Reynolds and Magnus Liljedahl who also won gold in Sydney in the Star class.

Britain had three other nominees for the awards: Ellen MacArthur, Ben Ainslie and Iain Percy.

Another agonising delay lay in store for Southampton sailors Mike Golding and Ellen Macarthur last night after storms swept through the Bay of Biscay postponing the start of the 2000 Vendee Globe round the world yacht race.

Their single-handed 27,000 mile ordeal was due to start at Les Sables d'Olonnes on Sunday but the day before, they and the other 17 skippers voted for a postponement until today after storms and gale force winds were forecast. Yesterday, the race was again put on hold for a further two days after charts showed 45 knots of wind for the Bay.

Following three years of intense preparation, Golding in Team Group 4 and Macarthur in Kingfisher are now forced to wait until 1600hrs on Thursday before they start their gruelling 100 days at sea but neither doubted the decision to delay.

"This was a correct decision, with seamanship and safety in mind," said Macarthur.

"We are doing a race with many dangers, that we accept. To take stupid risks at the start, and perhaps not just for ourselves but also our shore crews and supporters, would have been crazy. I don't think this was a question of fear or anything, we have all experienced big storms, and equally will do so many times in this race.

"But the Biscay is a special place, and with no-where to run to, it could have been suicide"