Casey and Cremen through to A/B semi-final at Olympics

SKIBBEREEN rower Aoife Casey and Margaret Cremen from Lee Rowing Club are through to the A/B semi-final of the lightweight women's double sculls at the Olympics in Tokyo.

The Irish crew finished third in their repechage early on Sunday morning with a time of 7:23.46, which was just behind the winning Switzerland crew (7:22.02) and the Russian Olympic Committee duo (7:22.72) in second. The top three from this race go into the A/B semi-final, and there were almost 19 seconds between Ireland in third and Austria in fourth, with Vietnam and Guatemala following in behind.

‘It’s surreal almost, we had a really good race today and definitely improved from our heat. We are really excited and it’s one step closer,’ a delighted Aoife said.

Aoife and Margaret will race in the A/B semi-final at 3.40am on Tuesday morning.

'It's surreal almost - we had a really good race today'

Aoife Casey and Margaret Cremen on reaching the lightweight double sculls semi-finals#RTESport #Tokyo2020

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Meanwhile, in the women’s singles, reigning world champion Sanita Puspure won her quarter-final in impressive style and will now compete in the semi-final A/B next Tuesday, while the Irish women’s pair of Monika Dukarska and Aileen Crowley also progressed to the semi-finals from their repechages this morning.