B-finals Completed at the Athens Olympics

By Melissa Bray

Canadian lightweight women’s double scull at Schinias
© Dominik Keller

Lightweight Women’s Double Sculls

The United States and Canada seem to like to go neck and neck against each other and today they did exactly that – after first passing Great Britain. Lisa Schlenker and Stacey Borgman of the United States came together as a crew only a month ago and said they had been improving with every race. Today they demonstrated that improvement by overtaking Great Britain and holding off the classy Canadian crew of Mara Jones and Fiona Milne.

This is Borgman’s first Olympic Games while Schlenker was a spare at Sydney. Together today they won the B-final to be ranked seventh in the world. Milne and Jones finished second and Great Britain held on to take third over Denmark.

Lightweight Men’s Double Sculls

The United States went two for two in the B-finals when Steve Tucker and Greg Ruckman, both at their second Olympic Games, won the B-final. But it was Ruben Alvarez Hoyos and Juan Zunzunegui Guimerans of Spain who led for most of the race over Ireland’s Sam Lynch and Gearoid Towey.

In this field full of World Champion single scullers, Tucker and Ruckman came from behind to tussle with Lynch and Towey through the middle of the race. Finally the Americans got the upper hand and in the process pushed past Spain. A last minute sprint by Michal Vabrousek and Vaclav Malecek of the Czech Republic propelled them past the Irish and into third with Spain holding on to second and the United States finishing first and therefore seventh in the world.

At the end Tucker described the race, “Our coach tells us not to be asleep at the start and not be so far behind at the 500 metres, but today I didn’t care. I said to myself, ‘it will go the way it will go.’ It was a big technical difference from before (the semi-final). We were much longer in the water. If we had the race we had today in the semi-final we would have been on the edge of qualifying for the A-final.”

Steve Tucker of the American lightweight double after his B final
© FISA

Ruckman, “If we go to the next Olympics we will do it in the four because the double is so hard.”
Tucker added, “I want to rest from the double. It is so hard.”

Lightweight Men’s Four

Russia’s flying start took them into the lead and off to the best start in this six boat B-final. Behind them Spain was struggling to hold this fast opening pace as last minute Olympic qualifiers Serbia & Montenegro began to make up lost ground. By the half way point the race was all about Russia and Serbia & Montenegro as both boats charged away from the rest of the field with Russia holding the advantage.

In the final sprint, however, Serbia & Montenegro had the better power and as both Russia and Serbia & Montenegro moved up to 39 strokes per minute, the Serbian & Montenegrins got their bow into the lead. Russia held on to the second spot while the United States had to overtake three crews to take third. 

Three seat for the United States crew, Paul Teti commented, “Even the B-final was extremely hard because we were racing against people who have Olympic and World Champion gold medals.”

US two seat Matt Smith added, “We’ve done our best. We’re disappointed not to be in the final, but we still have time to improve for 2008.”

Women’s Quadruple Sculls

Two boats went head to head with a faster paced Denmark able to hold off any advances by Belarus. The Danes, after taking the lead, were able to move further and further away from Belarus who tried to hold on but finished almost four seconds back in second.

The Swiss quad won an Olympic diploma in Athens
© Dominik Keller

Men’s Quadruple Sculls

Australia came to the Olympics as A-final favourites after finishing with bronze at Sydney. There is nothing easy about the Olympics though and today they found themselves going head to head with Sydney Olympic Champions Italy.

Both Australia and Italy kept their rating at a high 38 stroked per minute to match each other’s pace at the head of the field before the Aussies managed to break free of the Italians at the 1350 metre point. Then the Swiss began to charge. Coming from behind, Switzerland had worked their way past Estonia and then Italy and they were now moving on the Australians.

Australia had just enough lake left to remain in the lead with Switzerland finishing second and Estonia slipping through to take third.

Men’s Eight

This is the first time Poland has had a men’s eight at the Olympics since 1972 and when they qualified in June this year, much celebrating went on. Today they led the B-final ahead of Italy’s ‘Otto+.’

However the solid early lead of a full boat length was taking its toll on the Polish. As the final sprint came into view the Italians had worked their way up to being level with the Poles and continued to move further and further ahead. Poland had no response and Italy went from being a boat length behind to an open water lead at the finish. Poland held on to second with reigning Olympic Champions Great Britain back in third.

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