World Champions Dominate French Indoor Open

Four French world lightweight eight Champions РFranck Bussi̬re, Laurent Porchier, Jean-Christophe Bette and Pascal Touron were top of this years Concept2 Open held in Paris on Sunday.

They were among 105 contestants in the men’s lightweight ergometre race.

Bussière completed the 2000 metre course in 6:12.5, one hundredth of a second ahead of team-mate Porchier. The race was a close one, with all first three finishing within the same second. The French record of 6:11.2 however remained untouched.

The heavyweight men’s race was dominated by Olympian Frederic Kowal in 5:53.0. He was followed by national squad member François Meurillon. Vincent Maliszewski took third position. World men’s four champion Gilles Bosquet rowed in tenth, 19 seconds behind the winner.

Four French records were also bettered during the day including the lightweight women’s best time of 7:35.9 for the 30 – 39 year old age category by Salwa Boussoukawa by nearly 13 seconds.

In the 40-49 year old men’s category, a new record of 6:12.6 was set. A  new lightweight women’s over sixty category best time was recorded at 8:46.9, and new record in the heavyweight women over sixty category was set by Renée Camu in 8:22.2.

The Concept2 Open is the third largest indoor competition to be held with close to a thousand participants attending this year. 22 categories ranging between juniors and over 60 made up this huge indoor rowing event. For more information visit www.concept2france.fr