ROTTERDAM, The Netherlands -- The U.S. under 23 women's eight did it again. For a fifth time in a row, to be exact, the women's eight brought home gold at the 2016 World Rowing Under 23 Championships.
For stroke seat Kendall Chase (Evergreen, Colo.), this afternoon's race was a revenge race.
Finishing fourth in the women's pair final on Thursday, Chase and Georgia Ratcliff (Falls Church, Va.) left yesterday's race on the water wanting one thing: redemption.
"When you taste what it feels like to get on the podium and win a medal for a world championship regatta, you just want to keep going," said Chase. "I am so proud of these girls. Georgia and I were definitely feeling the race from yesterday; we even took a redemption-ten for gold, since we didn't get the result we wanted yesterday.
"The most important thing, though, is that we came together today. The eight has been the focus. We all committed to one another and went after it in the first 500 meters."
And went after it they did, as coxswain Colette Lucas-Conwell, Chase, Ratcliff,, Sarah Dougherty (Kent, Wash.), Regina Salmons (Methuen, Mass.), Gia Doonan (Rochester, Mass.), Kendall Brewer (Austin, Texas), Cassandra Johnson (Eden Prairie, Minn.) and Erin Briggs (Orono, Minn.) cleared the field of competitors within the first 750-meters of the race. The crew would ultimately take the gold medal in a time of 6:36.90, finishing 9.16 seconds ahead of Great Britain (6:44.06) and Russia (6:45.50).
"I was just making sure they stayed chill but relished what they had just accomplished," said Lucas Conwell when asked how she handled the crew through the first half of the race. "I continued to urge them for more, half a boat length of open water wasn't going to be good enough for us. We didn't want to leave anything on the water."
The victory marks the eighth gold medal for the U.S. eight in its history at the under 23 world championships, an event in which the U.S. has never finished off the podium.
In total, the U.S. capitalized on two of the four medal opportunities during today's finals with one gold, one bronze and two fourth-place finishes to close out the under 23 competition at the 2016 World Rowing Championships.
Evaporating a 14-year medal drought in the event, Brennan Wertz (Marin, Calif.) and Jovanni Stefani (San Francisco, Calif.) won the first under 23 medal in the men's pair since 2002.
"We felt very well prepared," said Wertz. "We had good training and a lot of help from Craig (Amerkhanian) from Stanford and Stuart Maeder from Dartmouth, who was actually in this event. We are grateful for that."
While some may have taken the five days of rest as a blessing, Wertz and Stefani spent most of the time itching to race.
"It was a lot of build-up," Wertz said. "The water has been nice when we have been practicing, and the boat has been feeling great. I've never had to wait like that, and I don't know that I enjoyed that aspect of it. But, our goal was to advance right to the final. It was a new experience, and you learn from it and move on. We came in wanting to make that final and that is what we did; it's great to medal."
Quick off the start, Serbia took an open-water lead over the field within the first 500 to force Wertz and Stefani to spend the rest of the race fighting to inch into the lead shell. Within the last 300 meters, France made a blistering sprint to nab the silver medal in a time of 6:59.44, 2.6 seconds ahead of the American's time of 7:02.04 . Serbia would maintain its lead and finish in 6:58.01.
Emily and Eliza Kallfelz (Jamestown, R.I.) finished fourth in a well-fought final for the under 23 women's double sculls title. Finishing in a time of 7:34.00, the Kallfelz came just shy of the podium with 2.78 seconds separating third and fourth place.
Through the first 1000-meters of the race, the field stayed tight-knit with only 2.74 seconds separating the top-four crews of Russia, Great Britain, Belarus and the United States. Making its move with 750 meters remaining in the race, the British crew took advantage of the fading Russians to move into the top spot, followed quickly by the pursuing crew from Belarus.
Great Britain would ultimately win the race with a time of 7:23.46, followed by Belarus (7:29.26) and Russia (7:31.22).
Also finishing in fourth place, Cicely Madden, (Weston, Mass.) clocked in at 8:32.67. Last through the 500-meter mark, Madden powered through the Czech Republic and Australia with a strong move, which held throughout the middle thousand of the race.
The race for medals was just as impressive, as Germany was overtaken by Lithuania and Sweden just as the crews were crossing the halfway mark. Lithuania's Ieva Adomaviciute was ultimately able to overtake the two scullers and win gold in a time of 8:20.49 ahead of Sweden (8:23.90) and Germany (8:26.38).
Before medals were won, three junior quarterfinals and a repechage set the stage for the U.S. crews early in the morning.
As the field behind them fought for the remaining two semifinal slots, the men's quadruple sculls lineup of Clark Dean (Sarasota, Fla.), Zachary Skypeck (Miami, Fla.), Andrew LeRoux (Venice, Fla.) and David Orner (Darien, Conn.) cruised through the quarterfinal in a time of 6:10.31.
In a 1,500-meter battle of will with Poland's Fabian Baranski, Jack Luby (Barrington, R.I.) secured himself a spot in the semifinal with a time of 7:40.26. Sitting in fourth place for a majority of the place, Luby stayed within one second of the Polish sculler before muscling his way through in the last-500 meters for the third and final qualifying spot.
"When you are going head to head like that, it is all about keeping on the pressure to see who will break first," said Luby. "You're really just trying to put the other guy through the crusher; we were both trying to do that to each other. I managed to keep going long enough that I gained a little ground, and it gave me the inspiration to keep going for the rest of the race."
Unable to secure one of the three advancing spots with at time of 7:06.81, Conor Donadio (New Milford, Conn.) and Jeffrey Schlyer (Davis, Calif.) will now race in the C/D final on Saturday morning.
Making a decisive move through the halfway mark, the junior women's eight advanced to the final alongside Russia after this morning's repechage. Finishing in 6:54.45, the U.S. started down but surged ahead of the Russian crew at the thousand to take the first qualifying spot. They will join Germany, Italy, Czech Republic and Belarus in the final on Sunday.