U23 Women's Double (BW2x) - Final

The Dutch boat of Roos De Jong and Laila Youssifou clocked the fastest qualifying times in the heats and semifinals. They lined up alongside the Romanian duo of Vivianna-Iuliana Bejinaru and Ioana Vrinceanu in lane four, the reigning under-23 World Champions in this event.

The Romanians charged out of the starting blocks and showcased their form by seizing the lead from the first strokes. With one quarter of the race gone, it was Germany in second position in lane six and the Netherlands in third. But it was almost impossible to identify the boat order as less than three seconds separated all six boats at the 1000m mark.

Romania pushed on the gas to secure their lead. At the half-way mark the field behind them remained extremely tightly packed. By then New Zealand had moved into second followed by the Netherlands. With 500m left to row, the Romanian lead was diminishing with all boats in hot pursuit. But the spirited Romanians had done enough to safeguard the gold and defend their title. New Zealand take the silver and the Netherlands the bronze.

Results: ROU, NZL, NED, GBR, BLR, GER

Viviana-Iuliana Bejinariu – ROU – gold
“It feels very good to be World Champion. It was a very hard race as the other crews are very fast. It was a very hard race because the other crews were just fighting and fighting.”

Claudia Hyde – NZL – silver
“We are really proud of ourselves as we couldn’t do any better. We now go back to winter in New Zealand with a nice 40 hours of travel.”

Roos De Jong – NED – bronze
“We are a bit disappointed with our final, but the Romanians were really good. We had a good race, but maybe the nerves of the final got to us a little bit.”

B-Final

The middle lanes were occupied by Hungary in lane three and Italy in lane four. Those two crews swapped between first and second place, rowing neck and neck, up until the half-way mark. Clear water separated the two crews from the rest of the field. Italy then upped their stroke rate to ascertain their win in the B-Final in this event and finish seventh overall.

Results: ITA, HUN, POL, CHN, LAT, DEN