BEIJING - Olympic rowing officials have rejected a protest from New Zealand lightweight scullers Storm Uru and Peter Taylor against the result of their semifinal yesterday.
The New Zealanders complained late last night that weed had affected their lane and slowed them into fourth place behind crews fromGreece, Denmark and China. Only the top three crews advanced to tomorrow's final.
A jury of world governing body FISA today ruled against the New Zealanders in a statement made just after midday.
"The Board of the Jury considered the facts of the protest and concluded that no evidence had been found to support it. Therefore the protest was rejected."
Nobody from Rowing New Zealand was available to clarify the details of the protest as its coaches and management were planning for today's racing in which five crews have reached A finals.
Two hours after the ruling today, Uru and Taylor raced their B final, winning comfortably in the same lane three that caused them problems in the semifinal.
Their time of six minutes 27.14 seconds was more than 3sec faster than yesterday and would have easily been good enough to head off Chinese scullers Guolin Zhang and Jie Sun.
Despite requests from journalists and FISA officials, Uru and Taylor refused to stop in the media "mixed zone" today to discuss the protest.
Throughout the regatta the New Zealand team have routinely defied FISA requests that they use the mixed zone, with management adamant that the athletes complete a proper warm down.
The double's target was to be the first New Zealand lightweight rowers to reach an Olympic final.
They had been confident after a strong showing in the heats and a campaign earlier this year that saw them qualify at a sudden death regatta in Poland to earn their Olympic ticket.
