African rowers look for Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Qualification

The 2023 World Rowing African Olympic and Paralympic Qualification Regatta will be held from Monday 23 to Wednesday 25 October on Tunis Lake, in Tunisia.

Coupled with the African Rowing Championships, this will be the first of four Contintental Qualification Regattas (Africa, Asia & Oceania, Americas and Europe) and the second opportunity to qualify for the Paris Olympic / Paralympic Games, after the 2023 World Rowing Championships earlier this year.

Almost 70 rowers will take part in the qualification events, competing for five qualification places in each the men’s and women’s single sculls and one spot in each the lightweight men’s and women’s double sculls for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. For the Paralympic Games there will be one spot available each in the para PR1 men’s and women’s single sculls, and one spot in the PR3 Mixed Double Sculls.

In the men’s single sculls, the top name to follow is Mohamed Taieb of Tunisia, who was the highest African sculler ranked at the 2023 World Rowing Championships – and who qualified through the AOQR in 2019 for the Tokyo Olympic Games. Egypt’s Abdelkhalek Elbana and Benin’s Privel Hinkati also qualified at the same event in 2019 and will look to repeat on their performance. The final two spots might be grabbed by Stephen Cox of Zimbabwe, and Riccardo Bouehi of Ivory Coast – but watch out for Sid Ali Boudina of Algeria, usually competing in the lightweight men’s single, who will try to qualify for his third Olympic Games.

The women’s single sculls has fifteen entries, and the favourite is certainly Courtney Westley of South Africa, fresh off an A-Final at the 2023 World Rowing Under 23 Championships, and a silver medal at the World University Games Regatta in China. Nihad Benchadli of Algeria and Sara Zammali of Tunisia did qualify through the AOQR in 2019 too, and despite not competing at the World Rowing Championships in Belgrade, are confident that they can book their ticket to Paris. Watch out too for Kathleen Noble of Uganda – she became the first rower representing Uganda at the Olympics in Tokyo and will certainly want to qualify for the Games again.

The lightweight men’s double sculls has six entries and might go down to a battle between Egypt, who finished 22nd at the 2023 World Rowing Championships, and Algeria, who did not compete but has a strong pedigree in this event – watch out too for the Plunket twins of Zimbabwe. The lightweight women’s double sculls has only four entries and with one spot available, Tunisia might have the edge over Egypt, having finished ahead of them in Belgrade.

With four entries in each of the three para-rowing boat classes, the competition will be fierce to grab the top spot. Tunisia’s Maher Rahmani finished just ahead of South Africa’s Lifa Hlongwa in Belgrade, and would want to qualify in the PR1 men’s single on home waters. In the PR1 women’s single, it will be a rematch of 2019 between Asya Sururu of Kenya and Nigeria’s Mary  Oluwatoyin Alayode. The PR3 mixed double sculls will see four brand new crews competing for the first time on the international scene.

Racing will start on Monday, 23 October at 9:00 AM local time. The finals for the Olympic and Paralympic boat classes will be held Wednesday, 25 October, starting at 9:40 local time.