Irish Rower Sanita Puspure narrowly misses out on semi-final spot

Irish rower Sanita Puspure agonisingly missed out on a place in the single sculls semi-finals by just .65 of a second in Rio today.

The 34-year-old finished in fourth place, with only the top three qualifying, in what was widely regarded as the toughest heat. The Cork-based woman looked completely out of contention after the halfway mark, trailing the third-place Belarusian rower by a length and a half.

With just 500m to go she seemed to be labouring but surged late on, almost closing a significant gap to narrowly miss out on qualification by .65 of a second.  The time of 7:28.68 would have been good enough in any of the other three heats.

She can still row in the C & D final but that will prove little consolation.  Australia, China and Belarus took the top three places in her heat.