Men’s Four (M4-) – Finals

A-Final

Romania had the fastest opening pace and they held 50 strokes per minute to take the lead. This is the crew that are the 2018 under-23 World Champions. Australia, who won at World Rowing Cup II, then took over in the lead with European Champions, Great Britain the closest challengers. Australia and Great Britain qualified for the final from Friday’s time trials with all other crews coming through from yesterday’s repechage.

Australia’s Masters, Purnell, Hargreaves and O’Brien then moved clean away from the rest of the field and got to a clear water lead over Great Britain 1 and Germany who now sat in third. Germany finished third at the 2019 European Championships. Germany then started to move on Australia and this gave them a small edge over Great Britain. Germany looked smoother than Great Britain, but the British looked powerful. Australia retained a very high stroke rate and stayed in first.

In the final sprint Great Britain did a kick and overtook Germany. Australia at 41, Great Britain at 42-43 with Germany at 39-40. Australia had won. The British took silver over Germany by just over a second.

Results: AUS, GBR1, GER, DEN, ROU1, POL

Nicholas Purnell, Australia, Gold,
“To win here means a lot for us and also for our country! One of the Australian coaches, who has also coached me before, passed away at the beginning of the week so it’s really nice to be able to win the podium for him. The water was really wavy up at the start so we focused on rowing clean.”

Sholto Carnegie (s), Great Britain, Silver,
“That was a rough one! The wind really picked up but we’ve got a good rhythm. By the World Rowing Championships, I think we’ll have a really good 2k race. We’re building a really exciting project here!”

Maximilian Planer, Germany, Bronze,
“We were expecting tough conditions because of the head-wind, so we just focused on technique, holding level, and sticking to our way of rowing and we focused on our own boat. Around the 1000 meter mark, we realised we could win a medal so we put in a fight over the last 500 meters. The last 250 meters we were level with the British but they pulled away. On one hand, we are happy with the result but it is also motivating us to work hard for the World Rowing Championships.”

Re-watch the race here!

B-final

Switzerland was the fastest off the line but then were overtaken by Netherlands 2 through the middle of the race. Great Britain 2 was the next fastest boat from yesterday’s semifinals but they were back in fourth. The Dutch 2 crew continued to push on in the lead with only one and a half seconds separating the top four boats through the middle of the race. The Czechs and the Dutch were now locked together at the front of the field. Netherlands 2 got to the line in first.

Results: NED2, CZE, GBR2, NED1, SUI, ROU2