Women’s Quadruple Sculls (W4x) – Final

Final-A 

Re-watch the live footage here

The Netherlands had the fastest time by a good margin in the heats two days ago and they sat in the centre lane as favourites for this final. The Dutch shot away at a 50 stroke rate, but Poland, rating 40 got a slight lead. But the Dutch of van Rooijen, Florijn, Souwer and Beukers got to the first 500m marker first. The Netherlands then managed to get a slight lead over Poland. Stroked by Olympic silver medallist, Nicole Beukers the Dutch remained in front.

Then China began to really move. The Chinese are Olympic Champions in this boat class from the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Their move then finished and Poland and The Netherlands moved away again from China with Germany also getting the better of China. In the final sprint the Dutch went to 37 and Poland responded with a 37 stroke rate pace. Poland went after the Dutch and they responded by going to 38 with Germany at 40. China had to contend with fourth.

Results: NED, POL, GER, CHN, FRA, RUS

Karolien Florijn, Netherlands, Gold
“That was a great race, we felt in control for the majority of it and we won, which is always nice. I’m not quite sure what’s happening in the future but really enjoyed that.”

Agnieszka Kobus (b), Poland, Silver
“I think it was one of the worst races in this boat, it was crazy we had to go back to the pontoon as we had a problem with one of our oars. We only had a 20 minute warm-up, but it was a pretty good results regardless of the problems. We will be in the quad again in the next World Cup.”

Constanze Duell, Germany, Bronze
“I think it was the best race of the weekend. The second 500m didn’t go as planned but we fought back and made a push to end up where we did. There will be another selection for the next World Cup so we don’t know what boats we’ll be in. We are very happy with today’s results.”