Five Irish boats book semi-final places

ROWING/World Cup regatta:All but one of the crews needed the second bite at the cherry offered by the repechages, but Ireland had a reasonably satisfactory first day at the World Cup regatta in Amsterdam yesterday. Five of the nine crews, including Olympic-class boats in the men's heavyweight four and the lightweight women's double scull, made it into today's semi-finals.

The men's four drove straight into the semi-final, taking the second qualification spot in their heat, behind the Dutch, whom they pushed hard for most of the 2,000 metres.

Alan Martin's crew gave way at the end and were never likely to best the home four at this stage - the men in orange took bronze at the last Olympics and will be targeting gold tomorrow, as the world champions, Britain, are not competing in this class.

The Irish may well line up beside them in that A final, as their semi-final today (2.45pm Irish-time) looks negotiable. France, New Zealand and Australia will be the main threats, with three to go through.

Niamh Ní Cheilleachair and Sinead Jennings, who needed a repechage to qualify, have a consequently more difficult semi-final (3pm), but they have avoided China's and Denmark's first crews.

A poor start in their heat yesterday cost the Irish, and even though they closed on the leaders through the race they could only finish third, Denmark's two crews filling the qualification places.

The Irish women were well in control in their repechage, however: China's fourth crew set off at a furious pace but Ní Cheilleachair and Jennings hit their best form in a while before halfway, took the lead and held it to the finish.

The absence of the senior A men's lightweight four, who have been training in Ireland and miss this regatta, weakens the Ireland team. Using the event to gain experience, the under-23 lightweight four found themselves out of their depth, as did the under-23 heavyweight four.

Caroline Ryan also struggled in the other Irish Olympic-class boat, the women's heavyweight single scull. She finished fourth in a very tough heat, but then could only do the same in a much easier repechage.

The performance of the four lightweight single scullers was much more promising, Orlagh Duddy, Orla Hayes and Liam Molloy making it through in repechages. Siobhán McCrohan, who got no breaks with her draw, missed out.

Duddy seemed on course to win her heat and qualify directly for her semi-final. She led for much of the race - only to be caught in the final sprint by Maria Pertl of Denmark.

In her repechage, the Derry woman faced Germany's Daniela Reimer, a silver medallist at Athens in the lightweight double, but this time Duddy made no mistake - while she was third at the 500-metre mark, she was first at the finish. Reimer took the second qualifying spot.

Cork woman Hayes and Galway's Molloy have both recently turned 21 and are among the up-and-coming stars of the sport in Ireland. They seized the day in their repechages to give themselves good springboards for next month's Under-23 World Championships.

At Women's Henley, meanwhile, Neptune and Commercial made good starts. Commercial's coxed four beat a lightweight crew from Stanford University by two lengths and meet Agecroft today, while Neptune's double scull beat Sons of the Thames by three lengths and will take on Hollingworth Lake Boat Club.

Crews from UCD, Trinity and Muckross begin their campaigns today.