The Sailing World Championships are World championships in sailing for the 10 events contested at the Summer Olympics, organized by World Sailing and held every four years since 2003. In contrast to other years, when each class organise their World championship under supervision of World Sailing, they are the combined World championships for all the disciplines of the next Summer Olympics and serves as the major qualification event for it.

The 470 (Four-Seventy) is a double-handed monohull planing dinghy with a centreboard, Bermuda rig, and centre sheeting. Equipped with a spinnaker, trapeze and a large sail-area-to-weight ratio, it is designed to plane easily, and good teamwork is necessary to sail it well. The name comes from the boat's length of 470 centimetres.