The first World Champions of the year were crowned today as the first day of finals closed out with the four Para-rowing events with a heap of really close races and a few thrilling photo finishes, which has not always been the case in para-rowing, and is tremendous to see.
So perhaps while we talked to folks from all the finals, the most clear and critical point to make is that the adaptive rowing and racing is getting better, especially at the top of the events. All four events could use more depth, but with para-rowing this is a complicated subject given that the nature of disabilities can vary tremendously.
Here is what we saw and heard today, in the order of racing.
AS Women's Single
The women's single was won by Moran Samuel of Israel, who won silver last year, and then earlier this summer made a bid for the frontrunner role with a World Cup win. Today she led most of the way down the course, pursued closely by a solid batch of scullers who pushed her to finish within five seconds of the world record.
"It's amazing to be World Champion," she said after the race. "The conditions were not the best with a bit of wind and waves, so I had to keep everything through the blade and the water very strong. It's a good time to congratulate my competitors; they gave me a good push. I knew they were pushing hard and I got the motivation to push harder. And though it was hard, I am so happy that this is the result and I feel so good about it. All the work paid off. I thank France for the great hospitality."
The race for the bronze medal came to a thrilling conclusion on the last stroke as Birgit Skarstein of Norway just barely nipped Claudia Santos of Brazil by 0.06 seconds, whew.
Quick quotes:
Rachel Morris - GBR - silver: "During the race I thought, oh my god, it hurts, but I am not going to give in. It is fantastic, the other girls are just world class."
Birgit Skarstein - NOR - bronze: "I don't remember that much of the race. In the end I knew the Brazilian was not far, so I had to give my very best."
For US sculler Jacqui Kapinowski, what has been a pretty rough week of illness as well as the temperature regulation problems mentioned a few days ago ended with a great race in which she captured the eighth and final Olympic qualification spot for the US with a huge surge in the second half of the race that took her from third into second and almost put her into the lead in the final 150 meters as she finished less than a second behind the leader.
"Well you know I got the job done," she said with some relief after the race. "I had a really tough week of being sick with bronchitis and an ear infection, but I did what I had to do. This is what I came here to do for the United States, was to qualify the boat for Rio and the job is done."
She raced in third early, but bided her time and then went for it.
"I was in third, but my strategy today since I was not feeling well was to take my time and just build as I go along. I took my time and just chipped away at it, and then as I got to the 500 just kind of kept building and brought it to the finish line.
Over the finish line, she threw her head back and looked to the sky; I asked her what she was thinking at that moment.
"I was thinking 'Thank God it's over and I qualified the boat!' [laughs]
AS Men's Single
In the men's single, Australian Erik Horrie won his third straight gold medal, followed by 2008 Paralympic gold medalist Tom Aggar who has been absent from the medal stand the past few years. Third went to Igor Bondar of Ukraine, who had made a bold bid for the front, but could not hold on down the track.
Quick quotes:
Erik Horrie - AUS - gold: "My oponents were even more eager than usual. I just stuck to my race plan. It is amazing to be World Champion for the 3rd time in a row."
Tom Aggar - GBR - silver: "It was hard to see where I was from lane one. Silver is a very good result and I am pleased. I am working very hard for this. "
Igor Bondar - UKR - bronze: "I am happy but a little bit disappointed as I didn't give my best during the race. Next year I hope to change the color of the medal."
US single sculler Blake Haxton had appeared to be on track for a medal earlier in the week, but today wasn't quite able to match the speed of the leaders, placing fifth overall, about eight seconds from the medals. I talked to Blake after the racing; you can read that conversation here.
TA Mixed Double
The Australian double of Gavin Bellis and Kathryn Ross repeated as champions this year, and noted that the competition is getting tougher every year.
"It's getting tougher and tougher each year for certain," Bellis said. "I heard that once heard that once before that someone said running the first one is the easy one, every year after that gets harder and harder and harder so yeah the field is definitely a lot stronger. So that's fantastic for the sport."
"It gets a lot more rewarding, I think, as you go on as well," Ross said. "We're definitely currently one of the older crews out there but we're chatting with all the young ducks!"
Quick quotes:
Lauren Rowles (s) - GBR - silver: "We just enjoyed the racing as our coach told us to do. We are very happy about the result."
Perle Bouge (b) - FRA - bronze: "We fought very hard, bronze was not easy to take. We are happy we did it. This tight race looks very valid."
The US double of Scott Brown and Elizabeth Mitchell placed fourth in the B final, outside the top eight required to qualify for Rio.
LTA Mixed Coxed Four
For any fan of rowing, this may have been the best race of the day bar none. For US fans, as well as the crew they were cheering on, it was admittedly little tougher to enjoy as the crew, which has been on fire all week, missed the gold medal to defending champions Great Britain by a mere 0.26 seconds, or about a bowball. The US crew was pretty deeply disappointed, but took solace in the fact that the event is getting better, and they are right in the hunt heading into Rio
"Each year para-rowing is going to just continue to get better and better as more of the world finds out about it," US bow seat Jaclyn Smith said. "You can see it going back to 2008 when there were only about six countries, and this year there's seventeen. Every country has great athletes and some may be born disabled, or are disabled due to unfortunate circumstances, but that doesn't limit you to doing great things. So as more and more of the world finds out about it, the better and better and better the competition's going to get."
I asked about the race against Great Britain, which from the video seemed never to have the crews more than a couple seats apart.
"Great Britain is an amazing crew, there's no doubt about it,"" she said. "They haven't lost a race since 2012. They're a strong crew, and they're going to continue to be a strong crew. They have a great nation behind them. We were neck and neck and we had them at the start, and then we did lose them a little, but we rowed a great race, they rowed a great race and it comes down to it might just have been who took more strokes throughout the race."
As for the qualification of the boat, which they locked in by making the A final, Smith had not yet shifted her focus to it.
"Honestly we haven't thought about it too much since we were really focused on this race, but we'll take this and digest it a little bit and then tomorrow - or maybe the day after tomorrow - we're going to forget about this and move on. Actually we're going use this and move on and become stronger throughout the year so that come next year we're put in the same position, if not better."
From all indications the US four is now part of a pretty serious rivalry, which is a part of competing at a high level that can lead to some of sport's most transcendent and sometimes magnificent moments. This may not be much consolation when you come out on the wrong end of the result, but these are the things that we have to remember and appreciate, that are really at the heart of what compels us to devote ourselves to our sport.
Quick quotes:
Andrew Todd (s) - CAN - bronze "It's my first international race and it is pretty incredible to be a medallist. We knew it was going to be tight, our goal was just to have our best race."
The World Champions have been named, the medals handed out, the Rio qualification spots awarded, and the para events completed; tremendous congrats to all the crews, and see you in Rio!
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