Mixed weather forecasted for World Rowing Cup

Conditions for the adaptive races shows sunny, warm, calm conditions with a small tail wind on the Munich 1972 Olympic Course. But the forecast for Friday changes to rain and cool conditions.

Friday will be a day of experimentation with time trials being carried out instead of heats. The trial will have some of the events doing fixed starts with the rest of the events trialling a floating start. This trial is for the purpose of looking at options for difficult weather conditions. Boats will leave one at a time in both the fixed and floating scenarios. The floating start will be from the 100m mark.

New to the World Rowing Cup series this year are three rules:

– Rerows will no longer occur

– A breakage by boats in the first 100m will not stop the race

– The ‘no needles’ policy will be in action

The first two rule will be unique to the Rowing World Cup series.

The four adaptive events opened with the arms and shoulders women’s single sculls. Six boats were entered so a preliminary race for lanes was held, and Alka Lysenko of the Ukraine grabbed the top sport, with France's Nathalie Benoit coming in second. The arms and shoulders men’s single sculls followed with 18 entries divided into three heats. World and Paralympic Champion Tom Aggar of Great Britain was the boat to watch, racing in heat two, and he did not disappoint, winning his heat over Australia's Benjamin Houlson. Another Australian athlete, Erik Horrie, enjoyed victory in heat one and Daniere Pascal of France won heat three.

Next up was the trunk and arms mixed double sculls. Divided into two heats, all eyes were on the return of Paralympic medallists, John MacLean and Kathryn Ross of Australia. MacLean and Roos raced in heat one but were pipped to the post by the French double of Perle Bouge and Stephane Tardieu. Heat two was won by Ivanov Dmytro and Iryna Krychenko of Ukraine.

Two heats in the legs, trunk and arms mixed coxed four saw a mixture of experienced rowers team up with some new names to adaptive rowing. The strength of Great Britain’s crew saw them come out on top, as their first boat won the second heat, and their second boat was second to Germany in the first heat. 

As the adaptive heats drew to a close on the first day of racing at the 2011 Samsung World Rowing Cup, heavy rain and stormy skies accompanied the final strokes over the finish line.