Gold medallist Iain Percy and Olympics newcomer Steve Mitchell are looking for the vital ingredient which served England's World Cup-winning rugby team so well as they bid for glory in Athens.

Percy, one of Britain's three sailing gold medallists at Sydney 2000 as he piloted his Finn single-hander to victory, and Mitchell have come together to sail the two-man Star in Athens.

"We were both new to the Star when we started learning in 2001. I was sailing a totally different boat and Steve was winning world championships in other classes," said Percy.

"We had quite a steep learning curve but it's come together well for us."

The combination was an immediate success with golds and silvers at regattas worldwide - but they know they need to add one more factor to the mix for Athens.

"We are probably thought of as one of the top teams - but we don't win when we're sailing badly," admitted 28-year-old (after March 21) Percy.

"The big challenge is to get to the stage where we still win when we are not going that well and that is definitely a few notches up."

Mitchell drew comparison with Sir Clive Woodward's heroes as he said: "It's the sign of a good team. You saw it with the England rugby team when they were having a bad match. People were slagging them off and saying they weren't playing well but they still won."

And Percy stressed: "Being favourites counts for nothing. It's about getting ourselves in a position where we still win on a bad day."

While Percy was striking gold in Sydney, Mitchell was still working full-time - importing flowers - but he now hopes to bloom at sailing's top level.

"It's about drawing on Ian's experience from the actual Olympic scene but for the pair of us it's been a whole learning process from scratch of a two-man boat which isn't sailed that much in England," he said.

"We've fitted together well as a team and managed to learn the core stuff, it's just fine-tuning now and trying to get the little advantages which will help us beat everybody else."

Although he only went full-time three years ago, Mitchell, 34, from Southampton, pointed out: "Before that I was sailing eight or nine weeks a year while also holding down a job so I was sort of semi-professional."

By contrast Winchester-based Percy has never had another career, revealing: "I finished university in 1998, campaigned for Sydney full-time and continued on after that.

"But before we had the luxury of lottery funding from UK Sport sailing was a semi-professional sport and even me, in my year off studying, did six months in a factory to pay for some of the events that year.

"We are a lot luckier now and I think that shows in the results. The good thing with UK Sport and the lottery is that it recognises potential, not just results, and when that potential is turned into results sponsors come on board and now Britain can go to even stronger heights than we have seen in the last few years."

But while British sailing currently rules the waves, Sydney glory has not changed Percy's lifestyle.

"I've still got the same girlfriend and still have no money. The girlfriend bit's all right but money would have been nice," he joked before insisting: "I didn't really want it to make too much of a difference because I enjoy the process of campaigning, sailing, developing the boat, plotting your campaign and raising the money.

"It's such a challenging sport at lots of different levels and I think that's why we enjoy it. You would never go into sailing for fame and money - you do it because you love the sport."