Jennings, Boyle in at the deep end

ROWING/Weekend Preview: Sinead Jennings and Heather Boyle will get the first real chance to test the potency of their partnership as a lightweight women's double scull at Duisburg regatta tomorrow and Sunday.

Jennings, the reigning world champion in the lightweight single, has gambled in moving to the bigger boat because there is Olympic competition in this class. As team manager Mick O'Callaghan said yesterday: "Athens starts here."

O'Callaghan expects the opposition to be of the highest quality, including reigning world champions Germany. Janet Radunzel and Claudia Blasberg won the title in Lucerne last year, but Jennings, characteristically, intends to put it up to the best from the off.

The progress of the newly-minted men's lightweight double - also an Olympic-class boat - of Richard Archibald and Eugene Coakley will also be watched closely, although this young crew are likely to be given more time to make their mark.

Timmy Harnedy will be out to impress again after his good showing in the lightweight single at Ghent last weekend, and the experienced Derek Holland also goes in this class, as does Alison Downey in the women's equivalent.

World champions Tony O'Connor and Gearóid Towey, competing in a regatta in this class for the first time since Lucerne, will hope to continue as they left off in the lightweight pair. They are joined by the under-23 crew of Noel Monahan and Paul Griffin.

The big event tonight is the Guinness Sculling Challenge at The Marina in Cork city. Corkman Albert Maher, who is based in Dublin, will represent the Dublin sculling ladder, with Belfast's John Armstrong and Cork's Eamonn Joyce providing the opposition.

In the women's challenge, Dublin's Siobhán Jacob is set to face opposition from Cork's Sandra Wall and Belfast's Andrea Armstrong. The women's race is scheduled to start at 7.0 and the men's 15 minutes later.