The US qualified 4 boats directly to the next round to start racing today in Racice, with Ben Davison winning his M1x heat outright, the Men's Pair taking a second place, and both the Light and Heavy Doubles grabbing a fourth place qualifying spot to move on.
Men's Pair
The Men's Pair of Justin Best and Mike Grady moved out on the field just behind the Romanians who are doubling into the ROU eight, and qualified comfortably ahead of the Croatian pair they trained with in the Pre-Worlds Camp in Zagreb.
For the duo, who took bronze at World Cup II, it was job one done:
"It's exactly what it was," said Best. "It was just a step to the next race, so we have all eyes set on Thursday now. We came here and we had high expectations of ourselves and obviously, the water is a little tough--tough to deal with--so we're going to have to reevaluate in the next couple of days, because you never know what the conditions are going to be like on the semifinal day."
"Overall, I was happy with how we remained calm, and we had a few tough moments but I think both of us stuck to what we wanted to stick: staying horizontal and just being relaxed, to let the boat do the work."
"I think that there were some positives and there are some negatives and we'll iron out those things and hopefully hit that semifinal really hard."
Best said it felt good to get back to racing, after a long pause since the Poznan World Cup: "I think we've improved a lot since World Cup II, just physically, and I think also together as a crew. We've found a way to maintain a more sustainable base, which I think is very important, especially in the pair. We know we can go hard off the start and we can be in the pack but that's what we wanted to work, that 1500 to 750. I think we improved on that: we showed it today and hopefully again, we show up on Thursday and put it out there."
Women's Singles
While the Pair was two to go through, both Women's Singles--Kara Kohler in the W1x and Mary Jones Nabel in the Light Single--faced races with just 1 to advance today, with a rep looming for second place and back.
On top of that, Kohler--just back in the single after Henley after racing the first part of the hear in the double--had the undefeated Dutch sculler Karolien Florijn to battle with for that spot. In the end, Kohler ran in third for a bit, behind Serbia's Jovana Arsic, before using an impressive second thousand to pass Arsic. It was not enough for the win, but her time and the way she finished should put her into the mix for the final.
"I was really liked my second half," said Kohler. "The first half felt little rough, trying to manage that ripping tailwind."
"Henley was my only international race [in the single this year], and I didn't really get to compete against any of this field that's here at Worlds. We have Karolien, the new hotshot in the single event, and she's been crushing the field by quite a bit this season. I knew she'd be probably a big challenger out there today, so that was fun to finally race her and see where I stack up."
"The goal was obviously to win today, but I don't think a repechage will set me back at all. I look at it as another chance to get into 2k rhythm and it's been a while since racing in the single on a 2k course: just another chance to sharpen things up."
Mary Jones Nabel wound up in a heat that Britain's Madeleine Fiona Arlett tried to steal with a blazing start. Jones Nabel and the Italian sculler, Stefania Buttignon, mounted a huge charge mid-course to get back on terms, but Buttignon just kept going and took the one semi-final spot on offer. Jones Nabel faded back to fourth, behind a resilient Arlett and Spain's Natalia Miguel Gomez.
And the Races for the Quarters:
Light Men's Double
With the other four US events today going to Quarter-finals--and having a 3 or even 4 to go standard--one might have expected more of a low drama, hold-some-cards start to the racing for all those crews. Yet, in a tough event like the Light Men's 2x, even taking top four can create some exciting racing, right at the start of the week.
That was the case for Jasper Liu and Zach Heese in the USA's LM2x, when they ran in 5th just astern of Turkey into the last 500 meters before pulling through to lock up the fourth, and final, qualification spot on offer.
row2k spoke with Liu after the race:
"It was pretty choppy out there, which we expected, and a pretty stiff tailwind. We found ourselves down in fifth, which is like not ideal, obviously, but I knew that we had the base pace speed, so we just trusted that, and every time we tried to make a move and change the speed, we gained a little bit."
From that standpoint, the duo felt they had control of their speed and position in the race, even before coming through Turkey to advance.
When asked what he hopes to dial in with his partner Heese for the rest of the week, Liu said: "Just run a little cleaner. As always, there's not much you can do to get more fit at this point, but executing better and more technically in the boat will help us gain some speed throughout the week."
Men's Single
For US single sculler Ben Davison, the first round was a bit less exciting, and more emphatic, as he won his heat comfortably over Denmark's Bastian Secher and Hungary's Bendeguz Petervari-Molnar. That moves Davison into the quarterfinals with a strong position in this his first year back in the single after racing the eight at the Tokyo Olympics.
Davison's time was the third fastest winning time on the morning, just ahead of the Olympic Champion from Greece, Stefanos Ntouskos, Dutch Sculler Melvin Twellaar, and Belgium's Kristian Vasilev. Germany's Ollie Ziedler laid down the best time in the first heat of the day, with Britain's Graeme Thomas putting down the second best winning mark--but that is definitely a way-too-early quick read on the field for the final, especially with New Zealand's Jordan Parry pushing Ziedler all the way to the line for the second best time on the day and Norway's Kjetil Borch also a bit ahead of Davison's time.
Davison said his piece today was good: "It was a bit bouncy, but it's fast conditions. It seemed like a nice tail at the start and then it just picks up as you go down. It just gets bumpier and bumpier, so paddling down [after the race], that was a little bit tricky, but overall, it was good . I mean, I row on the estuary in Oakland, so this is a 'nice' day there."
"I just wanted to get an idea of where I'm at, especially in the first half of the race. I haven't raced since the World Cup, and I'm constantly evolving and changing things, so I just wanted to get a sense how it felt relatively and I was pretty happy with it."
Davison's 13 National Team appearances stretch back to his time as a U19 and U23 single sculler for the US, and row2k asked him about being back in the single after his Tokyo Olympic turn in the eight:
"It's good. We're still learning as I go. I've spent some time in the single as a junior and under 23, but that's a whole different ballgame compared to this. So it's just we're still learning as we go. I enjoy it. I love it. I love the eight, too, but I love [the single] for different reasons."
One big difference with the single will, of course, be the progression with the 40 singles entries, whereas the Men's Eight rarely has more than ten, except perhaps in Olympic qualification years.
"It is different," said Davison of the full week progression, "as opposed to the eight, where you have one and then you might not have until the end of the week, managing that [progression] throughout the week [is important], but I'm here to race. I love to race--I'm glad I'm not in the Rep--but I'm happy to be having a couple of races, because that's why I'm here."
Men's Double
The Men's double of Tom Phifer and Sorin Koszyk pulled out a fourth place finish to move on, but Koszyk said afterward that it was not a great piece, especially in the bouncy water. He also mentioned that, while they saw good competitive splits in spots, they are really looking forward to the next round--and glad to be clear of the Rep.
Croatian sensations, the Sinkovic brothers, won that heat and posted, to no one's surprise, the fastest time of the event today, going 6:12.76 down the track. The other M2x heats went to Lithuania, Spain, France, and Australia, in speed order, with Norway right on Spain's stern.
Light Men's Single
LM1x Jimmy McCullough will head to the rep in this, his first Worlds, after taking fifth in a heat that quickly became a game of "who's coming with me" played by Andri Struznina of Switzerland. The answer, pretty early in the second 500, was Britain, Poland and Ireland, leaving McCullough to live to fight another day, specifically tomorrow, where he will face Finland, Georgia and Palestine in a two to advance repechage.
The Palestinian sculler he will face, Amel Younis, is also making his World Champs debut. We mentioned earlier this week that Younis, who grew up in the United States and rowed at Mercyhurst, was the first sculler from Palestine since perhaps the 2008 Olympics. In fact, he is the second, but our "since 2008" was right: Mark Gerban, who also grew up in the States represented Palestine at Worlds in 2005, 2006, and 2007, before missing Olympic Qualification. Gerban is here in Racice, helping Younis out, alongside coach Mark Grinberg from Riverside Boat Club.
This first race today was a learning experience, said Younis:
"The start took me by surprise, for sure. I have to be more aggressive off the start. I need to just like pop off as soon as I hear that ring. And then I just have to make sure I stay relaxed out there and just let the wind take me."
"This is the heat right now. Luckily, we got the reps tomorrow. So I plan on just learning from this and applying it to tomorrow's race."
row2k also spoke with Younis about what it means to be here, representing Palestine, and we will bring that to you in a feature later today.
Up Next
Monday will see racing start in the events below, along with the Reps for the W1x and LM1x in the afternoon. The morning session gets going at 9:30 local time again (3:30 EDT). Click these links for previews of each event:
W2- - LM2- - LW2x - W2x - LM4x - LW4x - W4- - M4- - W4x - M4x - PR2 M1x - PR2 W1x - PR3 M2- - PR3 Mix 2x - PR3 Mix 4+
Notes From the Course
Team GB's Rememberance: The GB crews are racing here with black ribbons on their unis, during their nation's national period of mourning following the death of Queen Elizabeth II. The GB Men's Quad will potentially be racing, or just finishing, on Monday during the two minutes of silence the British nation will observe at the end of the Queen's funeral. GB Rowing did ask World Rowing for a change in the schedule of races, as detailed in this release, but that was not granted and the regatta will run as scheduled, with any British crews on the water at the time will "dedicate our racing on Monday to the memory of Her Majesty The Queen" according to the release.
Better Bring A Sponge: The tailwind really built the water up into some good-sized bounce by the end of the course and that, combined with the fact that crews are cooling down in the last 500 meters of the course in the absence of a true cool-down area, and lots of the crews today--all singles, double, and pairs--were coming to the retrieval dock with a good amount of water aboard. Might explain the number of crews launching today with sponges for bailing.
And About That Traffic Pattern: as noted in the last note, there is no room on the course--a man-made channel just 8 lanes wide--for either a warmup or a cool-down area, and low water levels have made the small back channel unusable. At the start, crews are doing loops using one of the racing lanes in between races and, at the finish, crews can do loops in the last 500 meters. That led to a few crews turning in front of races--safely so far--and a few cases where cooling down crews were crossing the finish line just ahead of crews sprinting for the line.
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