12 Aug 2018
Junior Men’s Four (JM4-) – Finals
A–Final
The semifinals yesterday saw Great Britain record the fastest time by a handy nine seconds. They are the reigning junior champions and have two returning members to the boat. Douwe de Graaf and Calvin Tarczy have been joined by Theodore Darlow and Michael Dalton. New Zealand had won the other semi, but in a slower time. The first to show for today’s final was Italy with a very small edge over Great Britain and the Czech Republic. The British boat then picked up the speed going through the second 500 and they got their boat into the lead. New Zealand’s crew of Golbert, Crouch, Jenkins and Eliadis-Watson had come through into second with Italy holding the pace.
The British crew now showed why they are the reigning champions. They have moved to a full boat length lead and continued to move away. New Zealand tried to keep up but had to keep an eye on Italy. Great Britain sat on 37 with both New Zealand and Italy on 40. The eyes of the crowd remained on the Czech Republic. Great Britain had retained the World Champion title.
Results: GBR, NZL, ITA, ROU, CZE, GRE
Calvin Tarczy, Great Britain, gold
“What an amazing feeling! It was great to take the win today as we weren’t really expecting that. Coming into today we just wanted to repeat our performance in the heat. We really enjoyed the course and it’s really fast.”
Crouch Campbell, New Zealand, silver
“At the start we expected to be behind, I think the other crews had half a length. We knew Italy were very fast off the start. In the 2nd and 3rd 500 we slowly gained on other crews and made our way through those boats. In the last 500 we really just went for it.”
Achille Benazzo, Italy, bronze
“We really pushed off the start. At 500 we were 1st, but Great Britain and New Zealand pushed past at 1000. At 1200 we tried to catch them but couldn’t. In the last five we tried to stay in third, as Romania was pushing on us.”
B-final
It was only half a second between the United States making the a-final when they raced in the semifinals and they must have been the crew to beat along with Germany who had the fastest semifinal time of these crews. Croatia, however, had the lead at the start and maintained it over Germany through the middle of the race. Meanwhile the United States had started off at the back of the field and were slowly working their way through the field. Croatia was at 40 strokes and had no intention of letting anyone past. The US went to 43, but remained in fourth.
Results: CRO, GER, SRB, USA, ESP, SUI