Women’s Pair (W2-) – Finals

A-Final

In the heats two days ago Xinyu Lin and Rui Ju of China 2 proved to be the fastest overall. But today they were meeting United States 1 for the first time. In the US boat was Erin Reelick and Madeleine Wanamaker. At the start it was Aletta Jorritsma and Jose van Veen of Netherlands 1 that had the best pace. But it was practically dead event among the top four boats. Going through the middle of the race just two seconds separated the top four boats with the Dutch still just a fraction in front.

United States 2 of Felice Mueller and Emily Regan now got into second, but being on the opposite side of the course from the Netherlands it must have been hard to see what their opposition was doing. So Mueller and Regan did a big push going into the third 500. With just 400m left to row, it looked like Mueller and Regan had overtaken the Dutch. Regan is an Olympic Champion, while Mueller raced to fourth at the Rio Olympics in the pair. In the last sprint margins closed up again. Jorritsma and van Veen had done it. They win gold.

Results: NED1, CHN1, USA2, CHN2, USA1, ESP

Aletta Jorritsma (b), Netherlands, Gold
“That race was tough. We didn’t know where we were in relation to the other boats because it was close the entire time. We’re very happy with the result and glad we were able to lay it out for the final race. We know we have a good pace, and a fast start, but our finishes aren’t the best. But we were able to hold on a stay in front.”

Miaomiao Qin (b), People’s Republic of China, Silver
“We feel very excited about today’s races, we just did our best. Foreign coaches have helped us a lot to improve our skills and we have trained very hard before the season.” 

(Emily Regan and Felice Mueller of the United States won bronze but had to race off to join the women’s four final)

Re-watch the race here

The fastest time from yesterday’s repechage went to United States 4 of Olivia Coffey and Emily Huelskamp and they sat one lane over from United States 3. The number of USA crews in this boat class showed that crew selection was going on at this regatta and this race was likely to be a United States fight. At the start, United States 3 of Brooke Mooney and Meghan Musnicki had the edge. Olympic Champion Musnicki took a post-Rio break and this is her return to international rowing. Romania 3 slotted into second with Coffey and Huelskamp coming back from a rather slow start. Coming into the final sprint USA4 had moved into second and was closing on Mooney and Musnicki. Then Poland charged, but United States 4 was able to hold them off.

Results: USA3, USA4, POL, ROU3, HUN, JPN