Athletes had battled blustery winds and choppy waters yesterday at the Malta Regatta Course, and the elements were no more generous today.

The conditions prompted a break midway through the day's competition, while races in the mixed C2 500m category were cancelled.

Brendel and Hecker, who collected bronze at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, were the fastest qualifiers for the final from the heats in their event.

They clocked 3min 42.88sec, followed by Canada's Craig Spence and Bret Himmelman on 3:44.78 and Czech Republic's Antonín Hrabal and Jiří Zalubil on 3:45,17.

Women's K2 500m Olympic champion Dame Lisa Carrington of New Zealand was one of the star performers from the first day of competition.

She finished second with Alicia Hoskin from her heat in the K2 500m with a time of 1:47.31, with Polish home favourites Justyna Iskrzycka and Katarzyna Kolodziejczyk quickest in 1:46.87 en route to the semi-finals.

However, Dame Lisa and Hoskin were top performers in their semi-final in 1:43.70, while Iskrzycka and Kolodziejczyk missed out on the final after finishing fourth in their semi-final.

Zheng Pengfei of China, an Olympic silver medallist in the men's C2 1,000m, was the top performer in the C1 category across the same distance in the heats in Poznań, posting a time of 3:56.07 to reach the semi-finals.

He was also fastest in the semi-finals with a time of 3:54.69, making him one of nine athletes who reached the final, due to be held on Sunday (May 29).

In the women's K1 200m, Poland's Marta Walczykiewicz, a silver medallist at Rio 2016, posted the fastest time from the heats with 41.50, with the semi-finals scheduled for tomorrow.

Three of the four men's K1 200m heat winners recorded times of less than 37 seconds, with Lithuania's Artūras Seja the quickest in 36.06.

Cuba's Yarisleidis Cirilo Duboys, Canada's Sophia Jensen and China's Shuai Changwen advanced automatically to the women's C1 200m final, with a further 17 athletes entering the semi-finals.

In the men's K2 500m, Argentina's Valentin Rossi and Agustin Rodriguez and Portugal's Joao Ribeiro and Messias Baptista both clocked 1:33.33 to win their respective heats.

However, Rossi and Rodriguez missed out on the final after finishing fifth in their semi-final.

Canada's Pierre-Luc Poulin and Simon McTavish impressed in the semi-finals, recording a time of 1:29.64.

Australia's Jackson Collins was fastest in the men's K1 500m heats, his time of 1:41.80 comfortably sending him into the semi-finals.

A further two days of competition are scheduled at the latest leg of the Canoe Sprint World Cup.