Harrow's Richard Hounslow and partner David Florence made it through to the Olympic canoe double semi-finals in Rio.

The pair finished with the third best time from their singe run at the Whitewater Stadium, and were so content with their initial 103.27-second effort, they sat out the second round of qualifiers.

Hounslow later revealed they had decided against taking on a second run – the only nation to do so – to avoid "putting pressure" on themselves had they performed badly.

He said: “It was good to get into race mode after watching the competition yesterday. It is always great to get the first run under your belt to wash away the nerves.

"London 2012 was my first Olympics and I was certainly more terrified sitting on the start line there then I was today so I think that is a good sign of our experience.             

“We had a safe plan today that was very conservative but it worked well. We could have gone out there and tried to win qualification but we didn’t need to.

“Some of the other guys tried to do that and they have made mistakes and now they have put pressure on themselves to deliver in the second run which we don't have to so that it how it goes if you get things wrong.”

Defending an Olympic silver medal from London 2012, they will go compete in the semi-finals on Thursday, with Slovakian pairing Peter and Ladislav Kantar leading the pack so far.

The final will then be held at around 6.15pm on Thursday evening.