Tuesday was the final day of racing here in Rio before the medal racing begins; with sunny skies and only 5-7mph winds in the morning, it was a beautiful day at Estádio da Lagoa. From this moment forward there really are no do-overs, and a few favored crews were hit hard today.
The Upset Of The Regatta
As they did in the heat, the US women’s double of Ellen Tomek and Meghan O’Leary found themselves behind and out of qualifying position at the 1000. Today however, they really turned on the jets in the second thousand, throwing down the fastest second thousand in the field and qualifying for the grand final by a whisker (.05 of a second, to be exact).
While the New Zealand women’s 2x came into this regatta as two-time world champions and heavy favorites to win gold here in Rio, they had no answer for Tomek and O’Leary’s sprint today. Initially, the TV graphic flashed a 3rd place finish for the New Zealand double, placing the US in 4th. Within seconds however this graphic was pulled down and it was revealed that the US Women nipped the Kiwis at the line.
Our full interview with the US Women’s 2x after today’s race can be found here.
The 2016 US women’s double seem to be taking the same path as the London 2012 US women’s double; getting to the final the hard way, through the reps. Tomek & O’Leary are coached by Kevin Sauer in Rio, but were coached for much of the year by Sarah Trowbridge, who raced in the 2012 US women’s double in London; no doubt that Trowbridge’s 2012 experiences are paying dividends here.
Tomek and O’Leary have had plenty of Skype sessions with new mom Trowbridge for inspiration.
This crew has seemed to get stronger as the regatta has gone on, regardless of what the race or conditions have in store for them. Here’s to a big finish later this week!
Also in the women’s double, if you follow British Rowing at all, there was quite a bit of controversy regarding the selection of London gold medalist Katherine Grainger and her partner to the 2016 Rio team. After a tough showing at last year’s world championships and some of the international races this season with her partner Victoria Thornley, some had written her double off in Rio. Grainger, who has an Olympic gold medal and three silvers, and Thornley, who finished a strong second in their semi, probably answered more than a few doubters today.
Open Women’s 1x Cuts It Down To 12
Blowback (pun intentional) from Saturday’s lopsided heats results showed up in force today; most prominent victim was Ireland’s W1x Sanita Purspure, who missed out on the semis by virtue of landing in a stacked quarterfinal that included gold-medal favorite Kim Brennan, Ekaterina Karsten (racing in her 7th Olympics), and China’s Zhang.
Just a quick glance at the results is enough to feel for Purspure; her finishing time in her quarterfinal would have beaten fully SIX of the scullers headed to Thursday’s semis.
After a wild third-place finish in Saturday’s weather-affected heats racing, Brennan was back to her world-class form today as she finished with the fastest quarterfinal time of the day; looks like she brought the right boat today. It was also her birthday, so that’s a pretty good way to celebrate.
With the second fastest time of the day, US single sculler Gevvie Stone is looking more and more confident with every race in Rio. Gevvie truly seems be enjoying her Olympic experience so far and really seems to be very comfortable on this stage.
“Today it was windier when I raced than it is now, and I was joking, it seems to be the windiest when I race. I'm okay with that... I've raced Jeannine (Gmelin) and Magdalena (Lobnig) a lot at this point over the last two years. You kind of get used to each other's tendencies and strategies and I tried to make the most of my base rhythm, because that's my strength. We kind of cruised in the last 250. No one tried to change the order up too much,” said Stone after the race.
Despite winning her quarterfinal in comfortable fashion Stone is trying to remain focused on the ultimate goal of taking home an Olympic medal. “There are always things to work on. I haven't had a perfect race yet, so there are other things to work on.”
Tough Outing For the US Men Today
It was a tough outing for the US men on the water today. The US men’s pair was unable to maintain the same base speed as the lead pack after the first 1000, and found themselves in 5th place as they crossed the finish line.
“I think Olympic semifinals are pretty hard, and we know that. They’re always really close. Our goal was to put ourselves in position to advance to the final, and I thought we did a decent job of it at the start of the race. To me, it felt pretty good, and then I guess, that’s rowing. It hits you pretty hard, and we faded the last 750 of the race. That’s just the level of competition. I thought we did a pretty good job. Unfortunately, it wasn’t fast enough” said Nareg Guregian after the race.
Anders Weiss is trying to look ahead. “Of course, we are disappointed. We wanted to race in that A final. That being said, we want to place as high as we can. Right now, we’re going to sulk for 20 or 30 more minutes and then we’re on to the next race, which is the B final. We’re still racing incredible competition in the B final. It’s not like all of the talent is only in the A final“
Also coming in a little short today after a really strong showing in their heat Saturday, the US lightweight men’s 4- found themselves on the outside looking in after finishing in 4th place during their semi-final.
Lightweight Women Survive A Scare
The US Women’s lightweight 2x almost saw their Olympic dreams come to a crashing halt when bow seat Devery Karz caught a crab with her starboard oar 300 meters into the race. Fortunately for the US, Karz was able to quickly get her oar out of the water, and the crew slowly worked their way to the front of the pack and advanced to the semi-finals by winning their rep today.
When asked about the crab Karz said, “sometimes it gets a little bouncy and, you know, everybody makes a technical mistake. We just moved through it like nothing happened. We didn't focus on that stroke, but we focused on the next stroke and stayed calm and kept moving and we got the result we wanted… If you think about it too much, I think the next stroke gets hard. We also had some really good help from Princeton (women’s coach) Lori Dauphiny. She kind of set us up to move onto the next stroke and build up real quick.”
“We're a crew, so we do everything together,” added Bertko. “We communicate and we respond. We have a strategy for dealing with misadventure and just snaps right in. Devery comes from, I think, a pretty good adventure sport background, mountain biking and skiing, so she knows how to correct when the going gets tough.”
These days, taking your foot off the gas for any length of time in international rowing seems to carry a really heavy penalty; that reality hit hard for GB lightweight women’s double today, as the crew, with London gold-medalist Kat Copeland stroking, finished third and missed the semis, ouch.
Traditional Rivals
For quite a while, the battle to win gold at the world championships, at the world cup, and even the last Olympics in the men’s 1x has been between Mahé Drysdale and Ondrej Synek. Despite winning both of their respective heats on Saturday, they once again lined up against one another (earlier than might have been expected) in the men’s 1x quarterfinal.
For this race Synek took the early lead then gave way to Drysdale during the second half of the race. It’s always hard to judge from the quarterfinals where the top athletes are relative to one another as neither Synek nor Drysdale looked significantly gassed at the end of their race.
After the race, Synek said, “it was my tactic to be in front for the first half of the course and then just to qualify for the semifinal.” One thing that was apparent from this quarterfinal, pending disaster these two will go head to head once again in the final.
The fastest qualifier out of the Men’s Singles field was Croatian Damir Martin, just over two seconds ahead of Drysdale’s time.
Other Events
The Sinkovic brothers just held off Norway’s Olaf Tufte and Kjetil Borch to win their semi, and those two crews posted the fastest times on the day. GB, Lithuania, Italy and France also qualified, while the highly regarded German double, which included five-time Olympian Marcel Hacker, and the New Zealand crew both missed out on the final.
Eric Murray and Hamish Bond posted the fastest time in the Men’s Pair semis, but only 1.5 seconds ahead of the Italian pair, who won the other semi. Australia, France, GB and South Africa also qualified.
Here We Go Again
The Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas is a beautiful body of water, and fickle as all get-out. Today, the lake was mirror flat, then there was a tailwind, then a short time later a head wind (the light men’s four times jumped 10 seconds between the two semis when the wind changed direction). While conditions today were very fair across all six lanes, it’s looking at though the next two days may not be as friendly.
Tomorrow’s weather predictions are for rain along with a head wind for the start area, similar to Saturday.
At this moment according to FISA, a decision will be made on whether or not to run races tomorrow at 7:30am local time/6:30am EST. There is a possibility that racing will be canceled for the day however they will reserve the option to resume racing later that afternoon. If they elect to race in the afternoon the announcement will be made at 12pm local time. Races will begin at 2:30pm/1:30pm EST if that occurs.
FISA is trying hard to avoid any racing on Sunday, the nominal rowing/venue rest day, as that is the day the course is scheduled to be converted to the flatwater canoe/kayak race course.
Notes From The Course
@michieljonkman @RowingVoice @Lagoa_Rodrigo pic.twitter.com/9s6czFNwWk
— Daniel Spring (@fatsculler) August 9, 2016
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