Six final races are scheduled to be held at the Shunyi Olympicc Rowing-Canoeing Park on August 25, among which three will involve teams from the host country. Moreover, Andreas Dittmer of Germany, winner of the men's C-1 500m and runner-up of the C-1 1000m at Athens 2004, will show up again to vie with other paddlers for top honours.

Of all the eight semifinal races today, China only qualified for two events, women's C-1 500m and women's K-2 500m, through Zhong Hongyan and Xu Linbei/Zhu Minyuan respectively, which will be held on August 26.

Tomorrow’s final races will cover six events, namely men's K-1 1000m, men's C-1 1000m, women's K-4 500m, men's K-2 1000m, men's C-2 1000m and men's K-4 1000m. Among these, the host team is likely to take a medal in the women's K-4 500m. Two weeks ago, the Chinese team made up of La Mei, Wang Feng, He Jing and Yang Yali emerged runners-up in this event at the Duisburg World Championships. This time, with Zhang Hong replaceing He Jing in the Beijing open tournament, the team is ready to beat a strong field, including the world-champion team from Germany, to win the K-4 500m again.

In the men's C-2 1000m, China's Chen Zhongyun/Zhang Zhiwu will encounter the Hungarian brothers Kozmann/Kolonics Gyorgy, bronze medalists at Athens 2004. Competing in the men's K-4 1000m will be China's Li Zhen, Liu Haitao, Zhou Peng and Lin Miao, who will face the challenge from the Hungarian team, the bronze medalists at the recent world championships. According to the rules, as there are no more than nine teams in the event, all participating teams qualify directly for the finals.

Andreas Dittmer of Germany is probably the biggest star among all competitors in tomorrow races. He will compete in the men's C-1 1000m after ranking second among all the 13 paddlers in Thursday's heats.