Yachting Australia president Matt Allen is confident his sport can deliver on the latest Olympic benchmark report, but his most immediate challenge is a handicap win in the Sydney to Hobart.
On Wednesday, the Australian Olympic Committee issued their annual medals projection ahead of the 2016 Rio Games based on recent performances in major international competitions.
Sailing, which topped Australia's gold medal count at the 2012 Olympics with three, was benchmarked to equal their overall London medals tally of four.
"We've got some great performances coming through, we've just got to make sure that we manage them across the board and bring home the bacon the year after next," Allen told AAP on Thursday.
"As soon as you get into 2015, Rio looks really close and we're doing a lot of planning for Rio and also doing a lot of thinking beyond to (the 2020 Olympics in) Tokyo.
"Rio is clearly going to be a very challenging Olympics for our sailors and we're certainly confident that they are up to the task."
In the Sydney to Hobart, Allen has consistently performed well over many years in line and handicap honours in a series of different-sized boats called Ichi Ban.
He finished second across the line once and third twice between 2006 and 2008 in his old 70-footer, and was fourth and fifth on handicap in two of those years.
Last year, he launched his new 60-footer just a month before the race and finished eighth in both line and handicap honours.
Allen identified a couple of issues that needed correcting in the aftermath of last year's race and has notched several impressive results in 2014, including the handicap honours in last week's Big Boat Challenge.
Asked how much more optimistic he was and better prepared the boat would be this year, Allen said "infinitely.
"It's never easy to get a boat up to its maximum performance early," he said.
"I actually think we've got a bit further to go, probably in terms of learning how to sail the boat in various modes especially in light airs, where there's still a lot of performance gain to be had.
"We're quietly confident that we've ironed out the boat and it's really going to be up to how we sail the boat and the weather gods."
Allen said an early race forecast which suggests the possibility of some heavy weather around December 27, was good for his boat.
While he has lost navigator Will Oxley to the Round the World Race, Allen has secured a top class replacement in Adrienne Cahalan, who was part of several successful campaigns aboard Wild Oats XI.
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