New Zealand's Lisa Carrington in action in the K1-200m at the Tokyo Olympics. Photosport
New Zealand's Lisa Carrington in action in the K1-200m at the Tokyo Olympics. Photosport
Lisa Carrington has won through to the final of her specialist event, the K1 200m, perhaps the least surprising news of these Olympic Games.
The dynamic paddler won her semifinal in an Olympic best 38.127s, an impressive feat given the water was far from millpond flat.
Denmark's Emma Jorgensen pushedhard to finish second in 38.487s while Poland's Marta Walczykiewicz.
She will race for her third gold in the discipline shortly after 2.30pm today. In between times, she also qualified for the K2 500m final with partner Caitlin Regal, which takes place later this afternoon.
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If Carrington can win gold at Sea Forest Waterway, she will join Hamish Bond in the most select of Olympic clubs: those to have won gold medals at three consecutive Olympics.
It already feels like it would take an equipment failure or a sudden bout of campylobacter for Carrington not to add a medal of any description to her collection. One more would mean joining Dame Valeria Adams as New Zealand's most productive women's Olympian with four medals, while two more would pull her alongside fellow kayaker Ian Ferguson on five.
Adams on Sunday added bronze to the silver she won in Rio and golds from London and Beijing.
Carrington won gold in the K1 200m in London and Rio de Janeiro, and bronze in the K1 500m in Rio.
New Zealand's Lisa Carrington in action in the K1-200m at the Tokyo Olympics. Photosport
There were contrasting fortunes for the New Zealand crews in the K2 500m semifinals, with Carrington storming through to her second final of the day, this time in partnership with Regal.
Starting in the second final, the pair got off to an electric start and held a commanding .45s lead at the halfway mark. They held off the fast-finishing Australians Alyssa Bull and Alyce Wood to win in an Olympic best time of 1m 36.724s.
It was not so good news for the Kiwi crew in the first semifinal. Alicia Hoskin and Teneale Hatton jumped well but quickly fell behind. They would eventually finish seventh when the Slovenian crew tipped before the finish line, but they were 6.207s behind the leading Hungarian crew.
Carrington will now compete in two finals this afternoon with little more than an hour separating her tilt for a third K1 200m title and her first K2 500m win.
