Olympics-Rowing-Fans upbeat in rain as sculls heats begin

By Philip O'Connor

PARIS (Reuters) -The rain that drenched the spectacular Paris Olympics Opening Ceremony on Friday evening was still very much in evidence as fans streamed in to watch the rowing competitions at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium on Saturday.

Despite grey drizzly skies, spectators waved their national flags enthusiastically as the first heats in the men's and women's single, double and quadruple sculls were completed in calm but very damp conditions.

""Today was perfect, really quite flat water and I think it's going to be a bit warmer the next week ... it was really nice conditions," Dutch rower Karolijn Florijn told Reuters after winning her single sculls race.

With the top three in each single and double sculls heat qualifying for the quarter-finals and the rest going into the repechage, reigning Olympic champion Stefanos Ntsoukos of Greece cruised home in second place behind New Zealand's Thomas Mackintosh to get the proceedings underway.

"This raining day is not helping me too much, and the cold, but I hope (for) better weather the next days," Ntsoukos said.

The fastest time was set by Dutchman Simon van Dorp, who won the third heat in 6:49.93, with Giedrius Bieliauskas of Lithuania celebrating his birthday with a third-placed finish in the second heat.

In the women's competition, Australia's Tara Rigney put down an early marker in the first heat, completing the 2,000-metre course in 7:30.71, and current world champion Karolien Florijn also made it safely through to the quarter-finals.

Tokyo gold medallist Emma Twigg of New Zealand coasted to victory in her heat as she became the first Kiwi rower to feature at five Olympics, and Elis Ozbay of Turkey and Slovenia's Nina Kostanjsek also made history as the first women's boats for their respective nations at the Olympics.

In the women's double sculls, France set the pace with the fastest time to qualify for the semi-finals where they will be joined by Australia, Ireland, Britain, the USA and New Zealand, with the remainder of the entrants battling it out for the final two spots.

The French were also among nine teams to qualify directly for the semi-finals in the men's doubles event.

In the quadruple sculls, Netherlands, Britain, Poland and Italy qualified directly for the men's final while in the women's competition Netherlands, Ukraine, Britain and Germany all progressed.

Tokyo gold medal-winners China missed out on direct qualification for the women's quad final, but will get another opportunity on Monday.

(Reporting by Philip O'Connor, editing by Ed Osmond)