US rowing coach asks his crew to be careful

Sydney: Mike Teti, coach of the US men's eight at the Sydney Olympic regatta, warned his crew their gold medal chances were disappearing after Wednesday's lacklustre repechage performance.

The crew won in the slow time of five minutes 43.22 to advance to Sunday's final.

"We know we have some kinks to work out and we don't have a lot of time to do it," Teti told reporters.

"We have to get our act together or we are going to be left in their wake."

The Australians, without a medal in the event since capturing bronze in 1984, won their heat on Monday in a time of 5:32.85 seconds to go straight to the final. Britain won the other repechage on Wednesday in 5:38.59.

Romania, second to the US by just 0.02 seconds, and Italy, who were second to Britain in their repechage, also qualified for the final. Defending Olympic champions, the Netherlands, were last in their repechage and will miss the final.

Britain beat Australia at the last major lead-up regatta, the World Cup event in Lucerne in July. The US were third but did not field their regular crew.Australian men's eights coach Brian Richardson said the British "looked very hot".

"I'm not sure about the Americans, they seemed to be struggling a little bit. They're current world champions so we'd also expect them to keep improving through the regatta," Richardson told reporters.

World championship silver medallists from last year in the women's eights, the US, won their repechage on Wednesday by 0.26 seconds from Canada with Australia a further 0.10 seconds behind with fourth-placed Belarus also qualifying for Sunday's final.

Denmark on the mark

Denmark, defending Olympic and world champions in the men's lightweight coxless fours, won their repechage on Wednesday to advance to Friday's semi-finals.

The Danish crew, who finished a surprise fourth in their heat on Monday, led from start to finish on Wednesday.

Australian pairing Virginia Lee and Sally Newmarch, bronze medallists at last year's world championships, won their repechage to advance to Friday's semifinals of the women's lightweight double sculls.

Cuba, Austria and Belgium qualified for Friday's semifinals of the men's quadruple sculls with China the only crew to miss out after finishing fourth in Wednesday's repechage.

Ukraine, silver medallists in the women's quadruple sculls at the Atlanta Games, won their repechage to advance to Sunday's final along with Denmark.



(c) Reuters Limited.