Cool and clear conditions greeted Canada's top heavyweight women this Sunday morning at the Doug Wells Rowing Centre at Fanshawe Lake in London, Ontario.
The women's trials went off without a hitch - recent Munich World Cup gold medalists Darcy Marquardt (UVic) of Richmond, B.C. and Jane Rumball (Western Rowing Club) of Fredericton, N.B. won the final of the women's pair event in a time of 7:17.5.
"Munich was definitely a confidence builder," said Rumball. "Every time we race together we learn something. Our goal now is to keep finding more speed with some technical adjustments."
Sabrina Kolker (Burnaby Lake RC) of West Vancouver, B.C. and Krista Guloien (Thunderbird RC) of Vancouver were second in 7:25.0 and Uvic's Evan Wilson and Sarah Bonikowsky were third in the pair in 7:31.0.
In the women's single, Peggy Hyslop of Toronto's Bayside Club won in 7:56.6; 2004 Olympian (women's eight) Romina Stefancic of UVic was second in 8:02.7 and Kara Farquharson, a former junior World bronze medalist, was third in 8:08.8.
The winners of today's races join a group of athletes invited back to the heavyweight women's camp in London, Ont.
"Overall, I was very impressed by the quality of the athletes and was quite pleased with today's results," said senior women's coach Carsten Hassing, who came to Canada this year from Denmark, where he coached various crews at the National level.
The men and lightweights are continuing their selection activities after trials were completed at Elk Lake in Victoria, B.C. on Friday.
Those rowers who raced well at this weeks trials, also known as speed orders, are being considered for regattas such as the World Under-23 Championships, the Commonwealth Rowing Championships, the World University Games regatta, the Lucerne World Cup and 2006 Rowing World Championships (which includes adaptive).
Also rowing in separate trials this weekend were the adaptive (rowing for those with disabilities) rowers. Following selection, it was announced that three crews will be Canada's entries at this year's World Championships in England (Aug. 20 to 27).
An adaptive (LTA) coxed four will include John Moorcroft, Meghan Montgomery, Karen VanNest and Scott Rand (coxswain to be announced); the adaptive double (TA) will be Papito More Wilson and Caitlin Renneson and the single (A) will be Drew Rigden.