Men’s Double Sculls (M2x) – Finals

A-Final

After seeing so many top boats racing this morning in the B-final it was difficult to tell who would dominate this final. Switzerland’s Barnabe Delarze and Roman Roeoesli had the edge. They had won at World Rowing Cup II last month but had finished second in yesterday’s semifinal. In one lane over they had Henley Royal Regatta winners John Collins and Graeme Thomas of Great Britain. It was, however, the new combination of Netherlands 2 (Melvin Twellaar and Stef Broenink) that had recorded the fastest time in the semifinals.

Germany’s Tim Ole Naske and Stephan Krueger shot out at the start the quickest. They are a new combination for 2019 and finished third at World Rowing Cup II. Switzerland followed in second. Rating 35 Delarze and Roeoesli pushed into the lead with Ireland now pushing up into third. As the crews went through to the last 500m the order had completely changed. Switzerland remained in the lead with Philip Doyle and Ronan Byrne breaking into second and Great Britain now in third.

Ireland then really attacked and went to 36 with Switzerland going to 43. Ireland went to 39. Great Britain tried to hold on. There was smiles all round. Switzerland took gold. Ireland looked so happy with silver and Great Britain had the bronze.

Results: SUI, IRL, GBR, NED2, GER, AUS1

Barnabe Delarze (b), Switzerland, Gold
“We weren’t expecting much this weekend but we were able to improve every race. Today we expected a really long race. Whoever won it went to whoever made the least mistakes. It’s our first time becoming World Rowing Cup champions so it’s a great feeling. It’s a step towards our goal of the Olympics.”

Philip Doyle (b), Ireland, Silver
“This is hard to put into words, we really wanted this medal! We were moving well today, we glanced out and saw we were third and we had a pop! We’re hoping to continue this good form onwards.”

John Collins (b), Great Britain, Bronze
“Really happy with third! There is still quite a lot of fatigue in the legs so we were feeling the effects. World Rowing Championships is still the big aim and this is good preparation.”

Re-watch the race here!

B-final

France’s Hugo Boucheron and Matthieu Androdias took off very quickly in this B-final. France are the World Champions but haven’t been having such a good season this year. They also had last year’s bronze medallists, New Zealand in the race. But it was Amos Keijser and Nicolas van Sprang of the Netherlands 1 who won the race.

Results: NED1, POL, NZL, ROU, FRA, CHN