Women's paddlers through to semis

The New Zealand kayakers continue to put a smile on their supporters’ faces.

The paddlers have already made four finals, and won three gold medals, in Tokyo and today the women’s K4 500 – Lisa Carrington, Teneale Hatton, Caitlin Regal and Alicia Hoskin – advanced without problems to the semi-finals.

The New Zealanders led their heat by more than half a second at the halfway point, but slowed in the race for home and were overtaken by Hungary. With the first two place-getters straight into the semis, it was somewhat academic. New Zealand recorded 1min 33.959s.

The six boats that earned direct entry into the semi-finals tomorrow were Hungary, New Zealand, Bulgaria, Canada, France and Ukraine.

Far from resting on her laurels (three gold medals), Carrington is desperately keen for the K4 to do well. “I’m just so excited to finish off the Olympics with these girls," she said.

Hatton said she had drawn confidence from watching Carrington and Regal earlier in the week. “Seeing these girls out there crushing it in K1 and K2 gives you confidence to get in the boat with them. They've had pretty of practice in the 500 these last few days.”

And Hoskin added: "There's something pretty special about combining forces at the end of the week. This is our last event... it's cool to do it all together. But we're not getting ahead of ourselves."