Willms Takes the Armada Cup

For the second year running, 2001 World Championship gold medallist André Willms from Germany is the overall winner of the Armada Cup held on Saturday (October 27) in Bern, Switzerland.

Willms, who completed the 9km course in 33:20.47, was among the 213 rowers who took to the water in this year’s edition of the annual Armada. The 29 year old German rowed his way through the crowd of contestants on the Wohlensee near Bern who all took the start at the same bustling moment.

Among some of the top international names to enter were Lucerne World Championship B finalist Juri Jaanson from Estonia, Andreas Hajek – who rowed with Willms to win gold in Lucerne as well as fellow crew member Christian Schreiber. Germans Katrin Rutschow-Stomporowski – this year’s single scull world champion, as well as women’s quad world champions Manja Kowalski and Manuela Lutze took part in the contest.

Second In the Senior A category behind Willms was British Simon Richard Collins from Molesley Boat Club. He was followed by Andreas Schwab from Germany. Jaanson and Hajek took 4^th and 5^th position respectively.

Senior B was led by a German trio: Jörg Schultze completed the course in 34:14.24 and was followed by Jochen Engelmann and Johannes Baar.

In the women’s senior category, Katrin Rutschow-Stomporowski proved again to be the fastest woman, and finished in 37:08.58 placing her 40^th in the overall ranking. Silver was taken by Kim Plugge of Switzerland, while world championship gold medallist Manja Kowalski placed third. Manuela Lutze – winner of last year’s edition in her category finished 5^th.

The Armada Cup has been going on since 1987 and has seen likes of Steven Redgrave, Vaclav Chalupa, Kerstin Kowalski, Marnie Mc Bean and many more taking up the challenge. Marcel Hacker of Germany was the 1998 winner and Simon Stürm of Switzerland took the 1999 title.

For more information and full results visit the Armada Cup website on www.armadacup.com