After Phillips finished last in the opening race, she was forced into the afternoon's repechage, or second-chance races.

She finished fifth in her repechage heat but her time was better than the fifth-place finisher in the second heat, giving her the final spot in Friday's semifinals.

Phillips turned 32 today and is competing in her third Olympics. She finished seventh in 1992 in the K-4 and sixth in 1988 in the K-1.

Two other kayakers with Hawaii ties qualified yesterday for tomorrow's semifinals on Lake Lanier after having to battle back in repechage races from poor first heats.

Mike Harbold faced a tough challenge in his repechage after finishing sixth out of seven kayakers in the first 1,000-meter race. He needed to finish in the top four in the repechage, and was fourth through the first 250 meters after starting slowly.

But he finished second behind Robert Erban of Slovakia to qualify for tomorrow's semifinal.

Peter Newton shared his K-2 doubles kayak with world 200-meter sprint champion John Mooney.

In their opening 1,000-meter heat, the pair finished 31/2 seconds out of third place, forcing the repechage.

"This morning we were chopping up water trying to get down the water," Mooney said. "This afternoon it was a little more 'OK, let's think about the race here.'"

Newton, who now resides in Bellevue, Wash., and Mooney, of Eugene, Ore., started quickly in the preliminary race and even led briefly. But they faded and finished fourth behind defending champion Germany, Denmark and Britain.

That forced them into a quick turnaround, racing in the afternoon on fewer than three hours' rest. They didn't start as fast in the repechage, staying back and conserving their energy in a stiff head wind.

They were in a pack of boats at the 500-meter mark before making their move down the stretch to edge Slovakia. The top four finishers moved onto the semifinal.

But Newton has to hope that his partner won't be too tired after competing in today's 500-meter two-man kayak heat with Stein Jorgensen of San Diego.

"We really didn't want to race in the repechage," said Mooney, obviously thinking about all the wear and tear he's going to get this week. "But I'm glad how it played out."

Harbold and Newton finished eighth together in the K-2 finals at Barcelona.