Men's Four (M4-) - Final

At the World Rowing Cup last month in Lucerne, Australia and Great Britain raced each other right to the line with Great Britain winning. In the heats two days ago the British again beat Australia to win their heat. The World Champions, Italy won the other heat. Australia joined this A-final through the repechage. Today the fastest start went to Great Britain with Constantine Louloudis in stroke seat. Australia followed closely in second with Italy in third.

Through the middle of the race Great Britain and Australia had pushed away from the rest of the field. What could Italy do from their third place position? The final sprint came into view and Great Britain remained at the head of the field as Italy upped their rating and began to close on Australia. The high rating strategy paid off for Italy as they overtook Australia with just a few metres left to row.

Results: GBR, ITA, AUS, GER, BLR, ROU

George Nash, Great Britain, gold
“There was a lot of nervous energy already the whole weekend between all the crews. We very much respect all the other crews and their efforts. There is no perfect in rowing, and there is definitely still more in there for us.”

Matteo Castaldo, Italy, silver
“We were a bit nervous when racing against those champions. We had a very good start, but after 500 metres, GBR and AUS were one length ahead. We did a good job staying in our position and then in the last 500m we did a very good job. Rio is going to be very hard because there will be the USA, CAN, NED, lots of big crews. But we are working very hard and good, but I hope and I think we are going to do a good Olympics.”

Alexander Hill (s), Australia, bronze
“We tried attacking the Brits in the last 500m. But we also know that Italy has a pretty fast sprint, so we are just very happy that we managed. After this weekend, we will have to work more on our start and continue the work that we’ve been doing already.”