SINEAD JENNINGS and Claire Lambe are through to the semi-finals of the lightweight women’s double sculls at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio.
Letterkenny native Jennings – now competing as Sinead Lynch, her married name – with team-mate Lambe from Dublin, came safely through their heat this afternoon in the Lagoa Stadium and will now take part in Wednesday’s semi-final.
Jennings, from Hawthorn Heights in Letterkenny, and Lambe finished in seven minutes and 10.91 seconds.
They followed the heat winners, the South African pair of Kirsten McCann and Ursula Grobler, who came home in seven minutes and 7.37 seconds.
[adrotate group=”81″]The Jennings-Lambe combination were comfortably in front of the Brazilian crew – Vanessa Cozzi and Fernanda Ferreira – who finished in 7:20.79.
The Chinese pair of Wenyi Huang and Feihong Pan (7:00.13) and the Danish duo of Anne Lolk Thomsen and Juliane Rasmussen (7:01.84) qualified straight to the semi-finals from heat one.
From heat two, Dutch team Ilse Paulis and Maaike Head (6:57.28), who looked very impressive, and the New Zealand duo of Sophie Mackenzie and Julia Edward (7:02.01) advanced to the semi-finals.
[adrotate group=”38″]The event was running 24 hours later than had been originally scheduled after high winds around Rio yesterday meant that it wasn’t possible to stage, with the buoy syatem that marks the course affected by the elements.
For Jennings, a one day delay wasn’t too much, given that she has spent much of her life – the last 16 years, in fact – in pursuit of the Olympic dream.
Last September, Jennings and Lambe qualified the boat for Rio when they came third in the B final at the World Rowing Championships in France.
Previosly, Jennings had bid to qualify for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, but never got the chance to get to the qualifying regatta and she turned her mind to track cycling and just missed out of reaching London 2012.
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