IRELAND'S Neville Maxwell and Anthony O'Connor are on target for gold medals after winning their opening round heat at tile World Championships in Motherwell's Strathclyde Park in the west of Scotland yesterday.

With the World Championships this year restricted to non-Olympic boats, both the coxless four and the doubles scull crews that raced on Lake Lanier in Atlanta have had just a matter of days to settle into their new boats.

Beaten to Olympic bronze by the Americans, O'Connor and Maxwell offer the best prospects of taking a medal at these championships in the coxless pair.

They were in dominating form yesterday as they took to Scottish waters, leading from the start to win by four clear seconds in a time of six minutes, 56.81 seconds from Germany in the runners-up position.

Their success came despite the rust which had set in since leaving the United States last Tuesday and promises much for the championship series ahead.

The Neptune partnership pulled up in last year's final when O'Connor's back went as they were lying third behind the French and the eventual winners the Italians. This year, the competition is likely to be drawn from crews they have already raced, and in many cases beaten in the fours.

They are joined in Friday's semi-finals by the men's lightweight quadruple sculls of Brendan Dolan, Niall O'Toole, John Armstrong and Emmet O'Brien who were also easy heat winners against strong opposition from the Czech Republic and Britain.

Sculler Gearoid Towey and the men's coxed four finished runners-up in their heats, beaten by the USA and the Netherlands respectively but go into the repechage. So, too, do the lightweight eight who finished fourth in their opening round.

Meanwhile, six of Britain's nine crews were consigned to trial by repechage. Top title hopes Alson Brownless and Jane Hall remained on target with a heat-win in the coxless pairs in 8 minutes 13.79 seconds.