TOM Squires was relieved to navigate his first day of Olympic racing unscathed.

The Kingston Bagpuize windsurfer began his quest for an RS:X medal in Japan this morning, with a 9-13-(14) scorecard putting him 14th in the standings after three races.

In addition to the inevitable emotion that comes with making your Olympic debut, the 27-year-old had to cope with his less-favoured light winds in Enoshima.

But with three more races tomorrow and a bigger breeze forecast for the rest of the week, Squires is confident he can break into the top ten.

He said: “I was filled with anxiety and pressure going into my first Games.

“I had so many different feelings and you don’t get that very often, whatever it may be: anxious, nervous, excited – all those things mixed together.

“To get off the start line and then get into what I know, which is windsurf racing, was such a relief.

“I’m not so good in the light winds and we had two light wind races at the start.

“I have to go twice as hard as everyone else.

“They’re long races, about 20 minutes each and I kind of blew up about five minutes in so I had to recover that.

“But just to get an average result at the start feels good.

“I look forward to doing the basics to get back up the leaderboard after a light wind day.”

Elsewhere, City of Oxford’s Sholto Carnegie and Oxford Brookes University rower Rory Gibbs helped Team GB win their heat to reach the final of the men’s four.

The quartet, completed by Oliver Cook and Matthew Rossiter, finished more than two seconds ahead of nearest challengers Italy to give themselves a shot at claiming a medal on Wednesday.

Great Britain have won gold in the men’s four at each of the last five Olympics.

Bicester’s Fiona Gammond and her women’s eight crew could only manage fourth in their heat and will race again in Wednesday’s repechage as they target a place in the final.

Brookes rower Quentin Antognelli, who competes for Monaco, was fourth in his quarter-final after taking his second chance to win his repechage.

He goes into the men's single sculls semi-finals on Thursday.

In the pool, Kieran Bird was eighth in his 400m freestyle heat.

The Bicester swimmer’s time of 3mins 48.55secs was not enough to make the final, so he turns his attention to Tuesday’s 800m freestyle heat.