08 Nov 2022
Soares and De Jong set Silverskiff head race on fire
Italy’s Gabriel Soares set the Silverskiff Regatta on fire by winning and setting a new course record. This broke a 15-year record set by New Zealand’s Mahe Drysdale.
Soares finished the 11 km single sculling head race on Italy’s River Po in 40’16”. This was two seconds faster than Drysdale’s time set in 2007.
Born in Brazil, Soares moved to Italy and started rowing as a 13-year-old for the Bellagina Rowing Club. The now 25-year-old raced on the Italian junior national team back in 2015 and he’s been on Italy’s national rowing team ever since. A lightweight rower, he’s the current World Champion in the lightweight men’s single sculls.
Coming in second was Dutch sculler Koen Metsemakers (40’23”). Metsemakers is the current Olympic Champion in the men’s quad. Third place went to Olympic Champion and regular Silverskiff competitor and winner Martin Sinkovic of Croatia (40’31”). Martin’s brother and rowing partner, Valent finished in sixth place.
Soares admitted after the race that he had his sights set on getting in front of both Sinkovic brothers. He noted, “to overtake the Sinkovics I had to set the course record.”
For the women Roos de Jong of the Netherlands was first. De Jong most recently raced at the World Rowing Championships in the Dutch women’s eight. At the Tokyo Olympics she medalled in the women’s double sculls. Coming in second was Diana Dymchenko who recently changed from competing for Ukraine to competing for Azerbaijan. In third place was Antonia Abraham of Chile.
After a couple of Covid-restricted years, this 31st edition of the SilverSkiff had perfect weather conditions for autumn racing. The temperature was around 15 degrees Celsius and the water calm. Around 600 athletes competed, coming from 26 countries.
The scullers start one at a time and row upstream to a half-way buoy. They then race back downstream to the finish line. There’s three bridges to navigate on the course and the sculler must go through the correct arch of the bridge otherwise they are disqualified.
The regatta also includes the KinderSkiff for young rowers. This year had the highest participation ever in the Kinderskiff with more than 400 scullers taking part. Racing is over 1000 m and 4000 m.
For full results: https://www.silverskiff.org/
Photos thanks to Emanuele Riccio & Grazia Aimo