Men's Pair (M2-) - Final

As is customary, Murray and Bond were not the fastest out of the blocks, but by the middle of the race they had squeezed away to an open water lead. Germany One of Bastian Bechler and Anton Braun had slotted into second with a very tight battle going on between France and Great Britain One.

A procession formed to the finish line. Murray and Bond rated 38 and were so far in the lead they had to race against the clock. Bechler and Braun were at 35 and looked fatigued while Matthew Gotrel and Paul Bennett of Great Britain One managed to close a bit on the Germans.

As with the British women’s pair, New Zealand crossed in a time that closed in on the World Cup Best Time and won by a huge ten seconds. Germany took silver, with Great Britain in third.

Results: NZL, GER1, GBR1, FRA, ARG1, MEX

Gold – Hamish Bond (NZL)

This year we’ve really just been focusing on what we’re doing in our boat. Some of the other crews had a good start so we stuck with them and pushed our way through the middle.

Silver – Anton Braun (GER)

It was really exhausting due to the heat, especially at the start. We kepy some good rhythm, with some bursts at the 1,000 metres. The Kiwis were not in our race!

Bronze – Paul Bennett (GBR)

We have this mentality where we did in in the middle part of the race. Racing with New Zealand – you’re with them and then you’re like ‘goodbye’

B-final

In their first international outing for 2014 Serbia used a negative split strategy to row through the field and finish first. Nikola Stojic and Nenad Bedik of Serbia rowed together at the London 2012 Olympic Games and then went on to win gold at last year’s European Rowing Championships. There will be more to come from this duo in 2014. Behind Serbia and finishing very quickly was Germany Two and Argentina Two.

Results: SRB, GER2, ARG2, CHN, AZE, FIN