GOLDEN girl Sarah Ayton is bringing her second Olympic gold medal home to Weymouth after achieving a sailing victory in monsoon conditions with crew Sarah Webb and Pippa Wilson.

Miss Ayton and Miss Webb became only the second British female athletes in history to win back-to-back Olympic gold medals when they dominated the Yngling class with Wilson at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Sailing Regatta in Qingdao.

Miss Ayton and Miss Webb matched the achievement of their former helm Shirley Robertson, with whom they won Yngling gold at Athens 2004, to be the only British women in any sport to have ever sealed gold medals at consecutive Olympic Games.

Mum Colleen Ayton, speaking after yesterday's gripping medal race, said: "It was an awesome race.

"It was very hard to watch because although they were only about 500 yards out to sea the rain was so heavy we could barely see them.

"We lost them for a few minutes but once they came round the last mark and hoisted their spinnaker we could see the Union Jack.

"We could see they were in front and the Dutch team were four or five boats behind and knew unless anything drastically bad happened they would get the medal."

With only one point separating Miss Ayton and her crew from the Dutch team of Mandy Mulder, Annemieke Bes and Merel Witteveen, going into yesterday's double-points race, the British trio knew they had to beat their main rivals whatever the placings.

In a thrilling battle for gold, Miss Ayton's double world champion crew made no mistakes despite the intense pressure to sprint to a medal race victory, while the Dutch team finished fifth to claim silver overall.

Miss Ayton, 28, of Wyke Regis said: "It's been brilliant, this campaign has been about pure perfection and we're just an awesome team.

"We've been looking at starting as something we had to address, and we executed it perfectly today.

"2012 is on the doorstep and it's definitely on the agenda."

Miss Ayton's dad Brian, her brother Samuel and his girlfriend Abigail joined Colleen on the harbourside, under umbrellas, to support Miss Ayton and her team despite the monsoon conditions, along with Miss Ayton's fiancé Nick Dempsey's mum Olivia Dempsey.

Now Miss Ayton and her crewmates have followed through their perfect Olympic campaign, which saw them achieve back-to-back World Championship golds, the 2007 Pre-Olympic title and the European Yngling crown, they will all be supporting Athens bronze Olympic medallist Nick Dempsey.

Mr Dempsey, 28, of Wyke Regis, Weymouth is currently poised in fourth place as he gears up for a medal in the RS:X Men's Windsurfing fleet on Wednesday (August 20).

Colleen said: "Now Sarah's going to feel like me and Nick's mum, when she watches Nick race.

"She's got time now to focus on what he's doing. If the weather stays like this he'll do pretty well because it's pretty blowy out here."

Yesterday was also a proud day for the borough when former Weymouth-based sailor Ben Ainslie became Britain's most decorated Olympic sailor of all time after winning Finn class gold.