Men's four crash out of World Cup

ROWING WORLD CUP II, LUCERNE
Dates: 30 May - 1 June
BBC Coverage: Finals on 1 June live on BBCi and BBC website 0945-1100 and 1215-1430 BST; highlights on BBC TWO 1400-1500 BST

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Great Britain's men's four missed out on a place in the final for the first time in more than a decade at the World Cup event in Lucerne on Saturday.

Tom Lucy, Steve Williams, Peter Reed and Colin Smith led for the first 1,500m, but were rowed out of a place.

Alan Campbell reached the single sculls final with an impressive semi-final win over Olympic champion Olaf Tufte in seven minutes 42.40 seconds.

Zac Purchase and Mark Hunter triumphed in the lightweight men's double scull.

After the race, Reed said: "We came here and put our necks on the line with two new guys in the crew.

"We were only beaten by the world champions by two tenths of a second. Although we're knackered now we'll come back with a vengeance."

Elsewhere, GB's lightweight men's four finished second behind France, with the Irish quartet in third.

BBC OLYMPICS BLOG Five GB crews took gold in the opening World Cup event, but all will find it tougher to win on the Rotsee BBC Sport's Martin Gough

Elise Laverick and Anna Bebington were third in the women's double scull behind two top Chinese crews in their semi-final in a time of 7:29.03.

"It's all about improvements for us here rather than overall outcomes", said coach Miles Forbes Thomas.

"We're involved in a project of coming back into racing and things like recovery after racing are particularly important."