Rowing: Clean sweep gives Kiwis five medal chances

New Zealand will take a five-strong fleet into the Olympic rowing finals after a semifinal session that exceeded all expectations at the Schinias course yesterday.

None of the four New Zealand crews in action won their races but all did enough to qualify by finishing in the top half of the field, joining double sculling gold-medal favourites Caroline and Georgina Evers-Swindell in Saturday's finals.

Medals are within reach of all five crews - the men's and women's pairs, coxless men's four and women's single sculler Sonia Waddell - if they can peak for what could be one of the great days in New Zealand sport.

The most jubilant of yesterday's qualifiers was the women's pair of Juliette Haigh and Nicky Coles, nearing the summit of a fairytale climb after finishing a comfortable second in their four-team repechage - effectively a semifinal - yesterday.

The race was much less dramatic than their heat, when they tipped out and had to scramble back aboard and complete the race to qualify.

A breathless Coles insisted that the incident was not on their mind at the start line yesterday. "To be honest, it didn't even cross my mind."

Haigh, at 22 her partner's junior by 10 years, could not believe she had reached an Olympic final.

"We created a race plan in our training camps in Europe and it felt so good to have such an awesome race," she said.

The pair were always well behind Great Britain in the second half of the race but were simply intent on staying clear of third-placed Bulgaria, finishing in 7m 11.00s.

The other three New Zealand crews yesterday needed top-three finishes in their semifinals to advance. They achieved them in contrasting fashion.

The coxless four of Donald Leach, Mahe Drysdale, Carl Meyer and Eric Murray produced the best performance of the day, finishing within a boat-length of Olympic champions Great Britain for second place.

Establishing themselves in second place from the outset, the New Zealanders withstood surges from Slovenia and then Poland to cross the line in 5m 52.83s, 0.43s clear of Poland. They were the fifth-fastest semifinalists.

Waddell repeated her Sydney achievement of four years ago by cruising through her semifinal in third place but the men's pair of Nathan Twaddle and George Bridgewater were pushed all the way in achieving the same result.

The New Zealand pair were the fastest qualifiers through heats on Saturday but found the pace had stepped up considerably yesterday.

They were beaten home by gold-medal favourite Australians Drew Ginn and James Tomkins and the Croatian crew, barely holding off a fast-finishing Great Britain by 0.58s in a time of 6m 24.49s.

Twaddle and Bridgewater's semifinal was the fastest, seeing them qualify third-quickest for the final.

Waddell was far more comfortable in reaching her second Olympic final, although she had to row into a slight headwind.

She was well off the pace-setters, German defending Olympic champion Ekaterina Karsten and Bulgarian two-time world champion Rumyana Neykova, but was equally clear of rivals behind her at the finish line.

Karsten's winning time of 7m 31.9s was 10.09s clear of Waddell, who was considerably quicker in her repechage. She was the fifth-fastest qualifier overall for the six-woman final.

Super Saturday

Women's singles sculls 5.30pm

Women's pair 6.10pm

Men's pair 6.30pm

Women's double sculls 6.50pm

Men's four 7.30pm

- NZPA