First Medals Awarded at World Rowing Cup I

The first medals were awarded at the World Rowing Cup I in Belgrade Serbia today as three A-finals were held on Sava Lake.

PR2 women’s single sculls (PR2 W1x) – Final

Great Britain’s Lauren Rowles has spent many seasons in the mixed double scull, but for this, the first World Rowing Cup of the 2022 season, raced in the single scull. In a mature display of sculling, Lauren led her final from the start ahead of the reigning world champion in the boat class, Kathryn Ross from Australia. The two athletes have known each other for many years, but never raced directly against each other before.

Result: GBR, AUS

Lightweight women’s single sculls (LW1x) – Final

The Chilean sculler, Isidora Niemeyer was first out of the blocks and to the 500m timing point, but Mary Jones from the United States made up for her slower start and moved to the front of the pack by halfway. Meanwhile, Martine Veldhuis, a familiar name in this boat class, came through from sixth at 500m to second place at 1500m, despatching fellow Dutch sculler, Tosca Kettler in the process. Kettler put on a final charge towards the line but it wasn’t quite enough and missed out on the bronze medal to Spanish sculler Natalia Miguel Gomez by just 0.2 seconds.

Result: USA, NED1, ESP, NED3, CHI, ALG 

Lightweight men’s single sculls (LM1x) – Final

Spain’s Daniel Gutierrez had the fastest start, and led the final to 1000m when the young Tibo Vyvey worked his way through the pack from fourth to first. At the same time, Slovenian sculler Rajko Hrvat moved from fifth to second. Sweden’s Ahmet Rapi had an impressive scull and maintained third place throughout the race and took the bronze medal. Meanwhile, in the closing stages of the final, Hrvat took his rating up into the forties in a desperate attempt to catch Vyvey, but the impressive Belgian sculler had plenty left in the tank to hold off the threat, and take gold.

Result: BEL, SLO, SWE, ESP, URU2, POL