By Patrick Van Dort

Copyright newsletter

Scott helped Team Great Britain reach Thursday’s World Championships final in the women’s quadruple sculls with a convincing victory across the Shanghai rowing heats. Scott was back in the boat for the first time since Olympic Games gold last summer, with Paris colleague Lola Anderson also part of the Sunday crew alongside fresh faces Becky Wilde and Sarah McKay. Having entered as defending world champions, Scott and the Team GB crew took a significant step forward in defence of that title by reaching Thursday’s A final. And Scott was full of praise for weekend heptathlon silver glory by Newry’s Kate O’Connor at the World Athletics Championships. “I feel very free at the moment with just rowing and racing because I’m having such a short season, this being my first race,” said Scott on BBC Sport NI. “And in a weird way I’m just seeing what happens and going with it. “Actually I watched all of Kate O’Connor‘s heptathlon last night at the world athletics and it was very nice to see a fellow Northern Irish woman doing so well on the world stage and just enjoying herself and setting personal bests, which is really cool. “I took that into the heat today, I was just like, well, there’s no pressure, it’s just about enjoying it.” On the heat progress, Scott added: “It was a little bit like business as usual. “But it’s only the heat and you just want to get through the rounds and that’s what we did. “We executed the race plan we wanted to and looking ahead we have a very exciting platform to keep developing.“ For Team Ireland, County Fermanagh’s Ross Corrigan and Nathan Timoney finished second behind Romania to progress. It also marked a first race since the Paris Olympics final when they finished sixth, having won bronze previously at the World Championships. They return to the water for Tuesday’s semi-final heats. Banbridge’s Philip Doyle – who won bronze in Paris for Team Ireland – will tackle the men’s double sculls heats on Monday alongside Fintan McCarthy. Konan Pazzaia from Belfast will line out in the men’s single sculls heats on Monday.