Women's Double Sculls (W2x) - Final

Australia and Poland got to go directly to the final after winning their heats two days ago. Australia got away with the highest stroke rate and got to the first 500m mark the quickest. Meanwhile the World Champion New Zealand boat was slipping right back, almost to the extent that it looked like something was wrong in the boat. Poland’s Magdalena Fularczyk and Natalia Madaj was moving with Australia and doing their best to get into the lead. This Polish duo knew that they were the best gold medal chance for their country in front of their home crowd.

Then New Zealand’s Zoe Stevenson and Eve MacFarlane started to mount a huge comeback. They had gone from the back of the field and overtaken Belarus, then Great Britain, then France, then Australia and into second place. Fularczyk and Madaj must have seen the New Zealanders coming and, with the support of the crowd, the Polish duo held on to the lead. Stevenson and MacFarlane did an amazing race to get silver and Helene Lefebvre and Elodie Ravera-Scaramozzino of France came in to take the bronze.

Results: POL, NZL, FRA, BLR, GBR, AUS

Magdalena Fularczyk (b), Poland, gold
“It’s amazing to win here in Poznan in front of our home crowd, it is a great feeling. For Rio, we are expecting the most competition from Lithuania and New Zealand.”

Zoe Stevenson (s), New Zealand, silver
“It has been really competitive racing in the women’s double here in Poland. After this weekend we have five weeks of training coming up in Slovenia. Poznan has been great to prepare for unexpected weather conditions, just taking every race as it comes.

Elodie Ravera-Scaramozzino (s), France, bronze
“We are really surprised about the result because we were really happy even to get to the final. Our mindset at the start was to take the start and then no matter what happens, to have our best race ever. We are very, very happy because it is our first international medal on the elite level. Our goal at the Olympics is to get to the A-final and then we will see.”

B-final

The second crew for Belarus was in the lead at the start with two boats chasing hard – Denmark and Germany. Then Mareike Adams and Marie-Catherine Arnold of Germany did a push and got into the lead before the half-way point. This is a new line up following the results from World Rowing Cup II in Lucerne and they are likely to be the boat for Rio. Germany won with Denmark and the Czech Republic going to a photo finish.

Results: GER, DEN, CZE, BLR, CHN