Day sees quite a row

HYDERABAD: The journey from the Necklace Road to the Hyderabad Boat Club doesn’t take much time. It was a change of venue, this time to the opposite side.
The waters of the majestic Hussain Sagar Lake stayed the same. But on the very first day, heats of canoeing and kayaking ran into trouble. Not that the rowing was sans controversy. But once it started after all sorts of postponements, all arrangements were in order.
But on Wednesday, seeing was believing. The lanes had different widths, some wide enough for a steamer to glide through while some too narrow for even a canoe to pass. There was more. The basic principle of keeping the lanes in a straight line was not observed. There were curves over the 1000m stretches.
Not quite surprising, there were protests from participating teams. Major C. Raja Sekhar, the Services manager, was enraged. Services were disqualified in the kayak-2, race number one. “Our lane was too narrow and as the ropes of the two adjacent lanes merged, we had to stop. We were allowed to re-race by the jury. Amazingly enough, the jury changed the decision under pressure from others,� he lashed out.
In the other heats, it was a disappointing day for the hosts. They made it to the second round in only three races out of a total thirteen. Kerala’s rowers impressed, advancing in five races, while Services stayed close, making it to four.