Great Britain dominates Coupe de la Jeunesse

“The Coupe regatta is run in a two-day format with heats on Saturday morning and finals on Saturday afternoon,” explains Secretary General Christian Stofer from Switzerland. “The same is repeated on Sunday, but heats are seeded based on Saturday’s results. This means an intense weekend with lots of racing for the young juniors on the two days.” This year was the Coupe’s 33^rd edition.

Thirteen events featured on the programme and for the first time, the junior women’s eight was included and opened the regatta with a straight final on Friday. France took the gold, followed by Great Britain and Spain.

The 13 member countries, all from Europe, sent a total of 217 boats to the regatta. Great Britain topped the medals table with a total of 21 medals won (including eight gold), followed by France with a total of 11 medals (including five gold), and Ireland with an overall total of five gold medals.

Points are awarded to the top 11 boats, with 13 points awarded to first place and 1 point to 11^th place in each event.  In terms of points won, Great Britain also topped the rankings with 256 points, followed by Italy with 197 points and France with 159 points.  

Great Britain won gold on both days in three events: the junior men’s four, the junior women’s four and the junior men’s coxed four.

Ireland scored gold on both Saturday and Sunday in two events, the junior men’s quadruple sculls as well as the junior women’s pair, while France won twice in the junior men’s double sculls, Belgium in the men’s pair and Spain in the junior women’s double sculls.

The next Coupe de la Jeunesse will take place from 27 to 29 July in Cork, Ireland.