Guiseley’s Debbie Flood, Bradford’s Matthew Wells and Hebden’s Andy Hodge are all still in the chase for gold medals at the World Rowing Championships in New Zealand.

The new-look women’s quadruple scull came through a baptism of fire today to reach the final for Great Britain.

Flood, Beth Rodford, Fran Houghton and Annie Vernon pipped their German rivals by a tenth of a second.

Vernon said: “It was quite a race to the wire. The conditions got worse and worse down the course, and in those kind of conditions you don’t really want to be involved in a scrap to the line but we were and we responded in the right way.”

The crew was only put together just over a month ago after it was decided Katherine Grainger and Anna Watkins would concentrate on the double.

Houghton and Flood therefore returned to the boat in which they won silver at the Beijing Olympics.

The men’s pair of Hodge and Pete Reed, and the double scull of Wells and Marcus Bateman won their heats to make the semi-finals.