Danish lightweight four on the build

By Melissa Bray

In 2004 Denmark won Olympic gold in the lightweight men’s four. People were scarcely surprised. Denmark had dominated the lightweight four for the previous decade and all other countries looked to them as the team to beat. The crew then slipped out of the top.

Was this the end of the Danish lightweights?

After Athens, retirements came flooding in. First Eskild Ebbesen, who sits in the top 20 on the all-time medal table, announced his retirement after an illustrious 14-year international competition run. Then a year later Thomas Ebert and sometime fourth member, Bo Helleberg, went out with a bang, retiring after winning the lightweight men’s pair at the Gifu World Rowing Championships. By 2005 Stephan Moelvig and Thor Kristensen had disappeared off the international radar.

Now the four is being reconstructed. Spearheaded by the Danish National Federation and coach Bent Fransson (coach of the 2006 lightweight men’s eight), the project began in the early autumn of 2006. Nineteen hopeful rowers came together. The group included the lightweight men’s eight from the World Rowing Championships in Eton and the return of Eskild Ebbesen and Bo Helleberg.

The group was narrowed down to 12 last October and then in December eight rowers were short-listed to compete for seats in the four.

The eight rowers remaining in the group are Eskild Ebbesen, Morten Jørgensen, Mads Kruse-Andersen, Bo Helleberg, Kasper Jørgensen, Martin Kristensen, Jacob Amstrup Møller, and Mogens Jessen.

The plan is to send two lightweight men’s fours to the first and second Rowing World Cups this year; Ottensheim, Austria and Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The final crew will then be selected to race at the final Rowing World Cup.

Currently the rowers are all training at the Danish National Rowing Centre in Bagsvaerd, Copenhagen.

This weekend at the National Indoor Rowing Championships, six of the rowers will compete against each other in the lightweight men’s event – Ebbesen, Kruse-Andersen, Helleberg, Kristensen, Moller and Jessen. Morten and Kasper Jorgensen will compete as under 23s.

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