Records, Royalty and Weather – World Rowing Championships

Seville claims that it never rains this time of year. It rained. Hotels full of rowers woke up this morning to a heavy downpour. After two delays the racing started mid-afternoon for the second round of heats.

When you see four big men and one small guy hanging out together you know the men’s coxed four is coming up. This event opened the afternoon’s racing in slight cross wind conditions, under cloudy skies and flat water.

Great Britain’s crew started the season in the eight, but unsatisfactory results caused a reshuffle. Tom Stallard, Steve Trapmore, Simon Fieldhouse, Kieran West and coxswain, Christian Cormack formed the coxed four and today looked to repeat the winning performance that brought them gold in the 2000 Olympics. They got the quest started in style by taking a direct route to the final by winning their heat. Italy followed suit by winning the second heat. Stroked by Edoardo Verzotti they held off Slovenia by more than a second at the line. All other boats will be back for repechages on Wednesday.

Towey and O'Connor win their LM2- heat
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World Champions, Gearoid Towey and Tony O’Connor of Ireland have their work cut out for them in the lightweight men’s pair. Beaten by Chile at the final World Cup in Munich they will be hoping their last six weeks of training has made a difference.

But today it was Great Britain that indicated early boat speed. They qualified for the semi-final with the fastest time. Ned Kittoe and Nicholas English won their heat three seconds faster than the next qualifying boat after a tussle with Canada that had them pushing into the last 500 metres of the race. Italians, Franco Sancassini and Carlo Gaddi, also indicated early speed by winning their heat. Towey and O’Connor, winners of the second heat, will go into the semi as the third fastest qualifiers and Chile won their heat to put them into the semi. All other crews will go back to race in the repechage.

Lightweight Women’s Quad

The Australian lightweight women’s quad have a hard act to follow. At last year’s World Championships not only did Australia win, but they set a world record in the process. This 2002 line up has started on the road to gold with a win in the first heat that puts them directly into the final. In the same heat Spain put up a good challenge much to the locals delight, but they will have to try again through the repechage.

Action stepped up a notch on the bubble finish line of the second heat when the leading crew from the United States felt the heat of orange. Stroke, Maud Klinkers, of the Netherlands took up the rating and pushed the crew closer to the United States. Although finishing in second, the Netherlands forced a photo finish with their sprint. From the two heats, Australia and United States go directly to the final while all other crews go for their second chance.

Lightweight Men’s Quad

A slight sprinkle of rain kept temperatures cool for the lightweight men’s quad but didn’t hinder a capacity grandstand. They were treated to a display of dominance by World Champions, Italy. Emanuele Federici is the only change to last years line up and showed that his addition is a positive one. But it was the second heat that brought the crowd to their feet. The Spanish commentator let his normally calm voice show his excitement as he announced the race. Spain held on to first crossing the finish line ahead of the Netherlands. With this Spain put their first boat into the final.

Lightweight Women’s Double

Three heats started in the lightweight women’s double as the skies began to lift. Germany is the reigning World Champions and they continued their quest to add another gold medal by winning the first heat. Although Claudia Blasberg missed the final World Cup due to illness, the six week gap has put her back on form with partner, Janet Raduenzel.

In the second heat Australians, Sally Causby and Amber Halliday, finished with clear water to take them directly to the semi-final. This combination knows about winning, being the 2001 World Champions in the quad. They have yet to race the Germans this season.

Helen Casey and Tracy Langlands of Great Britain made comfortable work of the third heat and will move on to Friday’s semi-finals. All other boats return for the Wednesday’s repechages, including top names in single sculling, Monica Stan of Romania and Sinead Jennings of Ireland.

Lightweight Men’s Double

The biggest field of the Seville World Championships and the biggest field ever for the lightweight men’s double started the road to gold with Australia demanding the first spot in the semi-final. Daniel Stewart won the B-final in 2001 and this year is joined by Olympian Haimish Karrasch. They started their 2002 season at the third World Cup in Munich where they took silver behind Germany.

Heat two had World Cup yellow jersey winners, Peter Ording and Manuel Brehmer of Germany, taking lane four. The pair tussled with Russia before out sprinting Denis Moisseev and Andrei Chevel in the last 500 metres to take the lead and the second spot in the semi-final.

“Quite a strange looking race,” commentator, John Boultbee announced. Leading the way in the third heat was Tomasz Kucharski and Robert Sycz of Poland. Then there was a long gap back to Great Britain’s Tim Male and Tom Kay. Then there was another long gap to the next crew. Poland, therefore, looks to be on track for the World Championships after a patchy season that had Kucharski rowing openweight at the second World Cup and not making it to the third. Kay and Male will try for the semi-final through Wednesday’s repechage.

The final heat in the lightweight men’s double was no surprises when World Champions, Elia Luini and Leonardo Pettinari of Italy led from the start and took a spot in the semi over Japan who held on to second spot throughout the race.

Lightweight Men’s Four

It was a royal occasion for the lightweight men’s four. Sitting in the stands was Princess Benedicte of Denmark who came to watch the crew known in her country as ‘the Gold Four’. The Princess wasn’t disappointed. Denmark’s Hans Kristensen, Thomas Ebert, Stephan Moelvig and Eskild Ebbesen showed their winning form by taking the first heat.

In their second appearance this season, Canada had a race on their hands for a place in the semi-final. Despite a strong start, they were challenged by France through the second 500 and had to keep their whits about them to cross the line first. But it’s Italy that will go into the semi-final with the fastest time. In the third heat they led from the front and spent the race increasing their gap between second placed Germany.

The fourth and final heat had World Champions Austria battling with their down under counterparts, Australia. Down under finished on top by pulling out a superior sprint in the last 500 forcing the World Champions into the repechage.

Women’s Quad

The UKR W4x advance directly to Saturday's finals with their win in heat 1
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The wind died completely in time for the women’s quad. Ukraine has dominated so far this season and finished the 2002 World Cup series as yellow jersey holders. Despite a strong challenge from Australia, Ukraine pulled off another win to put them directly into the final. These two crews met for the first time at the third World Cup in Munich last month and since then Australia has closed the gap between the crews from four seconds to less than a second.

But it was heat two that brought the crowd to their feet. The almost untried Belarusian crew, who never got to test their boat speed at Munich, after being disqualified for an underweight boat, took an early lead. They were challenged by World Champions, Germany who are also an unknown element after injury kept them away from Munich. The two crews faced off with never more than a second separating them. Coming into the closing metres Germany challenged Belarus’s slight lead and in a photo finish, Belarus took the spot in the A-final by eleven hundreth of a second.

Men’s Quad

A switch to a breezy tailwind and choppy water greeted the men’s quad. The Germans are World Champions in this event, but with only Marco Geisler as a returning member to the boat, the top position could be up for challenge. Today, however, they took the direct track to the semi-final by winning the first heat over Ukraine.

The change in wind speed between races made it difficult to compare times from one race to the next. But Italy sent out a clear message of their intent by winning the second heat over Russia in a race that included Venezuela debuting in this event.

Poland stepped up to the plate in the third and final heat of the men’s quad. With the same lineup that placed sixth at last year’s World Championships, the crew is looking to move up in the rankings. However, 2001 silver medallists, the Netherlands, pushed them the whole way.

Women’s Eight

Two heats and seven boats started in the women’s eight. The first heat presented the first upset when the United States broke Germany’s 2002 unbeaten streak by crossing the bubble line first. 2002 yellow jersey holders, Germany, are now in the uncommon position of going back for a repechage while the United States, who have been clocking fast training times back home in Princeton, New Jersey, will move on in confidence.

Meanwhile, in the second heat the Romanian’s, decked out with Australian-made blades and a German-made boat, found themselves in the unusual position of being at the back of the field. It was the Australians that took charge from the start and will take the second spot in the final.

Men’s Eight

Capping off a day of delays and every type of weather, the men’s eight kept the audience at the course and in the mood. The United States pulled off a double header by following their female counterparts in winning the first heat. Their scorching time of 5.26 – only four seconds off the world record – threw out the gauntlet to the potential for a broken record in Sunday’s final.

Then, just to prove you can’t predict one race to the next, Canada grabbed the second heat by the horns and clocked a 5.25. But right there on the pace and facing each other in the repechage are the Italians, Germany, Australia and, a back on form, Great Britain. The only thing I can add at this stage is, phew, this final is going to be one for the record books.