Australia Hosts Olympic Hopefuls

Women’s eight racing
© Alistair Robertson

Trans-Tasman rivalry blazed over the weekend when Australian and New Zealand teams competed in the 2005 Australian Youth Olympic Festival.

The Sydney Olympic Rowing Centre in Penrith, Sydney hosted the two-day event with small boats opening the proceedings on the first day. Emma Twigg of New Zealand finished at the head of the field in the women’s single. Twigg has raced for New Zealand in the eight at the past two World Rowing Junior Championships and was selected to compete at the festival in October last year.

Jeremy Ellis of Western Australia won the men’s single over fellow Western Australian David Kelly. The more experienced Ellis competed at last year’s World Rowing Junior Championships in the quad finishing sixth.

Winners of the women’s pair, Tara Huntly and Sarah Cook of ACT came into the event as clear favourites. They both competed at last year’s Under 23 Regatta finishing second in the women’s four and at the festival they were part of the ACT squad that included 2004 Olympic bronze medalist Rebecca Sattin as coach.

In the men’s pair Western Australian’s James Gatti and Stephen Fletcher finished first. Gatti and Fletcher were both finalists at the 2004 World Rowing Junior Championships, Gatti in the quad and Fletcher in the double.

Victoria’s Heidi Wilson and Alice McNamara held off New Zealand to win the women’s lightweight double while their male counterparts, James Baker and Blair Tunevitsch of Tasmania won the men’s event.

Small boat racers joined together on the second day of the festival to compete in the big boat races with Western Australian crews shining in the men’s events. They finished with gold in the men’s eight, four and quad as well as finishing with silver in the women’s eight. This left Victoria to dominate the women’s races with gold in the women’s quad and eight with New Zealand picking up gold in the women’s four.

Australia finished well ahead of New Zealand in the medal tally winning 10 of the 12 events.

New Zealand’s high performance manager Andrew Matheson said the results were encouraging for New Zealand. “Rowing New Zealand is happy with all the results when age and experience is taken into consideration. All the athletes learnt a lot about racing at this level, travelling internationally as part of a team.”

Australia’s national development officer Adam Horner was impressed by the professionalism and sportsmanship of the athletes. Horner also commented on the excitment of the big boat racing. “In the six big boat finals there were a couple of photo finishes for minor placings.”

The festival is a biennial multi-sport event and was established by the Australian Olympic Committee for young Olympic aspirants to provide a lasting legacy of the Sydney 2000 Olympics. Attracting mainly teenaged participants the festival is committed to developing athletes from Australia and the Oceania region by providing an Olympic-type experience. This year 1,500 athletes competed in 14 summer Olympic sports.

A full list of results can be found at www.olympics.com.au

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