An emotional Nick Dempsey exorcised the ghosts of Beijing to pick up a thrilling London Olympics silver medal on home water at Weymouth.

The Athens bronze medallist was going for gold four years ago heading into the final medal race – where catastrophe struck and the Mulbarton sailor ended up missing out on a medal of any colour as he finished fourth.

But this time round, Dempsey made sure he would not miss out as he battled for silver behind confirmed champion Dorian van Rijsselberge of Netherlands, coming home second to confirm second step on the podium as the best Olympic result of his career.

Poland's Przemyslaw Miarczynski claimed bronze.

'It's been a pretty difficult four years but I always believed I could come here and do well,' said Dempsey, who admitted he only got an hour's sleep the night before his big medal race. 'I'm just massively relieved more than anything.

'It's been really tough. The Dutch guy had such a good start to the regatta and it was about coming to terms with that very quickly I was only going to be racing for second. I was desperate, desperate to win silver. Third was going to be a disaster, and fourth I don't know what I'd have done.

'I'm just glad I could do it for all the people who have helped me. Without doubt to have all my family and friends here to do in front of the crowd couldn't be better. This is a moment for reflection but I'm pretty sure this is not the end of the road.'