A NEW era of sport has been ushered in as the first ever European Championships began in Glasgow yesterday.

The inaugural day of sport saw qualifying rounds take place in track cycling at the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome, women’s artistic gymnastics at the SSE Hydro and rowing at Strathclyde Country Park.

It was a day of photo-finishes and upsets at the North Lanarkshire park as several fancied crews will have to fight again for the right to contest medals after a morning full of tight racing.

Great Britain’s top men’s boat, the eight, found the Dutch pace too hot to handle in yesterday’s heat and will have to race again in today’s repechage.

Their big rivals Germany, racing in heat two, made no errors and held on to qualify automatically for Sunday’s final, despite a last-ditch charge from Romania.

There was also an upset in the men’s single sculls as Olympic and European silver medallist Damir Martin (CRO) missed out on a semi final place.

He finished third in his heat, behind Kjetil Borch (NOR) and Vladislav Ryabcev (RUS), after the Russian overtook Martin in the final quarter of the race.

The European Championships are a major innovation in world sport as seven sports bring their existing events together under one banner for the first time.

The next 11 days will see world class athletes in aquatics, cycling, gymnastics, golf, rowing and triathlon competing in Glasgow and Scotland, while Berlin hosts the athletics.

The first medals of the Glasgow 2018 European Championships will be presented to athletes from the sport of synchronised swimming, with competition getting underway at Scotstoun Sports Campus today.

A temporary swimming pool filled with 330,000 gallons of water has been constructed over the tennis courts for the nine synchronised swimming events over five days of competition.

Up to 750 spectators can watch the action unfold.

Top prospects for the British team are City of Bristol Synchronised Swimming Club’s Kate Shortman, 16, and Isabelle Thorpe, 17, who will compete in the Olympic discipline, the Duet Technical
Their mothers, Maria Shortman and Georgie Thorpe, also competed together for Great Britain in the 1980s.

The teenage pair won the Senior Free Duet title at the 2017 British Synchronised Swimming Championships in Nottingham.

Kate, who is also the current British Free Solo champion, said: “We’ve been training all year for Glasgow; a few junior competitions including Junior Europeans and World Juniors, which were really great preparation. 

“We just want to get out there and hopefully get a personal best, improve our scores from junior level.”

Isabelle added: “We’re really excited to show everyone at senior level our new routines. 

“We competed earlier in the year in junior competitions and we can’t wait to get out there. 

“Competing in front of a home crowd is really nice, and everyone supporting is great – we can’t wait.”

The Mixed Duet event at Glasgow 2018 will be only the second time men have been able to compete at a European Championships.

Gold medallist from the 2016 European Championships, Russia’s Aleksandr Maltsev said: “We are very excited, for me it’s the second European Championships. I was in London with another girl and now it’s our debut. We want to do our best, we will show our new technical programme.”

Aleksandr is one of five men from five countries competing in Glasgow alongside: Pau Ribes Culla from Spain; Vasileios Gkortsilas from Greece; Giorgio Minisini from Italy (reigning World Champion); and Gokce Akgun of Turkey.

They will all compete in the Mixed Duet (Technical) this afternoon and again in the Mixed Duet on Tuesday morning.

Synchronised swimming events will take place at Scotstoun between today and Tuesday next week.

There are still tickets available for some sessions priced between £15 and £20 available.

Visit glasgow2018.com for more details.