Preview Day Two: Repechages and heats at the Olympic Rowing Regatta

The wind direction is likely to turn throughout the morning of racing to cross wind and then head wind conditions.

The day begins with repechages, the second chance for those who did not qualify yesterday to keep their Olympic hopes alive. The men’s double sculls repechage is first up and includes Olympic Champions, David Crawshay and Scott Brennan of Australia. Crawshay and Brennan need to finish in the top three to advance to the semifinals.

The lightweight men’s four is packed with talent including last year’s silver medallists, Italy. The Italians regularly field a strong lightweight contingent and at the 2004 Olympic Games they took bronze. Three boats from this repechage will advance to the semifinals.

The men’s single sculls has three repechages lining up and two boats from each race will get to advance to the quarterfinals. With 33 countries entered, this event includes a number of rowers who qualified through the continental qualification regattas – Latin America, Asia and Africa – thus a number of rowing development countries will be racing today. Repechage One includes Peru’s Victor Aspillaga Alayza who has medalled internationally at the lightweight level.

In Repechage Two Iran’s Mohsen Shadi Naghadeh has the credentials to do well. He is a two-time under-23 champion in the lightweight single and this is already his second Olympic Games. Lithuania’s Mindaugas Griskonis finished eighth at the 2008 Olympic Games and has pulled off some stunning races since including a first place at last year’s European Championships.

Niger’s Hamadou Djibo Issaka gained much crowd support yesterday in his heat. He finished at the back of the field, but as the first rower ever to compete for Niger at the Olympic Rowing Regatta, Issaka says that he has already created huge interest in his country for rowing.
The women’s single sculls has two repechages with the top two boats earning a spot in the quarterfinals. Kazakhstan’s Svetlana Germanovich had a solid race in her heat yesterday and has a good chance of qualifying today. Like the men’s single, this event has a good sampling of rowing development countries represented.

The lightweight women’s double sculls will compete for the first time today in three heats starting at 10:40am (GMT). Winners of the final Samsung World Rowing Cup, New Zealand’s Louise Ayling and Julia Edward feature in Heat One. They will face local heroes Great Britain and the ever-improving Denmark.

HeatTwo has the reigning World Champions Christina Giazitzidou and Alexandra Tsiavou of Greece racing against 2010 World Champions, Canada. The Canadians made a last minute change to their line up with Lindsay Jennerich now paired up with her 2011 partner Patricia Obee.

In Heat Three China’s Dongxiang Xu and Wenyi Huang will race. This is Xu’s third Olympic Games and she is partnered with newcomer 21-year-old Huang. They will face the late Olympic qualifiers, Germany. Anja Noske and Lena Mueller of Germany took bronze at the final 2012 Samsung World Rowing Cup in June.

The lightweight men’s double sculls debuts today with four heats being raced. The top two boats in each heat will get to advance to the semifinals and racing is likely to be intense in this boat class which pits similar weight and sized athletes against each other. The maximum average of each rower in this class is 72kg. Italy’s Olympic medallist Elia Luini has had a last minute change of partner with Pietro Ruta replacing an injured Lorenzo Bertini. This makes the crew an unknown quantity when they line up today. They will face stiff competition from Canada’s Douglas Vandor and Morgan Jarvis.

Heat Two in the lightweight men’s double features 2009 World Champions, Storm Uru and Peter Taylor of New Zealand. The duo has remained together since racing to a B-final finish at the 2008 Olympic Games. They have one of the hardest heats of this event as the New Zealander’s will face the reigning World and Olympic Champions, Zac Purchase and Mark Hunter of Great Britain. If home-crowd support is anything to go by the Kiwis will have a tough battle.

In Heat Three 2008 bronze medallists, Denmark (Mads Rasmussen and Rasmus Quist) are up against 2005 World Champions, Zsolt Hirling and Tamas Varga of Hungary. Hirling and Varga showed poor form at the 2008 Olympic Games and have only recently reunited to win an Olympic spot at the Final Olympic Qualification Regatta. Despite being a late edition their form has looked very promising this season.

Heat Four is likely to be dominated by Stany Delayre and Jeremie Azou of France. This French duo are both successful single scullers, but since coming together in the double they have created waves by medalling at both World Rowing Cups that they entered this season. Their greatest challenge is likely to come from Linus Lichtschlag and Lars Hartig of Germany who were fourth at the 2011 World Rowing Championships.

Starting at 11:50am (GMT) the first of two heats in the women’s eight get going. There is little doubt that the United States eight, as reigning World and Olympic Champions, are the favourites. Great Britain, however, will give them a run for their money if crowd support is anything to go by.

The final race of the day, Heat Two in the women’s eight, has three top crews racing each other. Canada finished a close second to the United States at the second Samsung World Rowing Cup this season and look to be a potential threat to the United States’ long unbroken winning streak. They will face 2008 Olympic silver medallists, the Netherlands and 2004 Olympic Champions Romania.