The Beach Sprints in Barletta featured everything that makes coastal rowing the wild cousin of the sport and a fun, if unpredictable, spectacle to behold - including a capsizing complete with a jet ski rescue. That misadventure prompted the last four uncompleted events to be shifted a whole day in search of slightly smaller, and safer, surf, meaning the action wrapped up on Monday.
"In beach sprint racing there are a lot of highs and lows," said the USA's Chris Bak, one of the athletes who found himself racing on Monday after waiting through Sunday's breakers to see if his attempt to defend his gold medal in the single would ever get off the beach as scheduled.
The 'highs" for the US in Barletta included the mixed quad--with Bak at bow--claiming its first victory, making Jeni Sorli, Alexa McAuliffe, and coxswain Coral Kasden the first women to win Beach Sprints gold for the US; Americans earning four time trial wins across the nine events to start the regatta; and the US team delivering a five medal performance that not only matched last year's total haul but also converted two of last year's bronzes to silvers, as four boats made it all the way to the (two-boat) A Final this time around.
The "lows" included Bak's own tough quarterfinal loss in the single once racing resumed on Monday; the mixed double also being eliminated in the quarterfinals after a four-minute turnaround for Kory Rogers from stroke in the quad to bow in the double behind Christine Cavallo; and the junior women's double of Annalie Duncomb and Annelise Hahl getting excluded after turning sideways in Sunday's wild waves and impeding the Italians in surf that led to the regatta being stopped two races later when the French double capsized and needed to be rescued with the jet ski.
"Sometimes the ocean determines the race," said Bak, as you can see here in that quarterfinal, but his gold in the quad--his second win at this level--makes him the most decorated American athlete in the Beach Sprints game, despite missing out on a chance to defend his title in the single.
"In the single, I ended up placing 7th overall which was not my best performance. I am not one for excuses, but food poisoning the night before a race definitely does not help your odds of winning. I am just grateful to be a part of the top beach sprint rowers in the world and I can't wait to come back stronger next year.
"I am extremely excited to see the sport continue to grow," Bak added, "and I hope to inspire the next generation of rowers as all chapters must come to an end. Next year we will come back hungrier than ever."
Quad Breaks Through For USA
The mixed quad's win on Saturday followed right on the heels of the two junior single silvers won by Anderson and Hahl capped a three event podium run for the USA on day one of finals .
The quad returned three of the athletes--Bak, Sorli, and Rogers--who won bronze last year, but this year they teamed up with McAuliffe and coxswain Kasden to break through and win.
Just fifth in the opening time trial, the group's closest race in the finals wound up being the opening quarterfinal battle against the British, where the US came from behind on the water to have Bak win the round with his sprint up the beach.
"We really came together after the tight finish against Great Britain," said Bak. "Then, we knew we had to race hard against the favorite New Zealand, a boat containing four Olympians, but once we started that race, we quickly gained open water on them and never looked back. That gave us immense confidence leading into the final round against Italy.
"As we were passing the second to last buoy in the final, we all knew that we had the win and we could hear shrieks of joy coming from one another. As we landed on the beach, I knew that we had just claimed the title of world champions. I hit the buzzer, ending the race, and immediately ran back to embrace my teammates.
"All of the many months of training, traveling, and rowing together led to this moment," Bak said. "Every person in that boat contributed all of themselves in order succeed. Being able to race as a team makes it all the more special."
A Pair of A Finals and Silver Linings for Junior Singles
Both Malachi Anderson and Annelise Hahl entered the singles event for the first time this year; building on their experience as 2022 medalists in the doubles, they became the first two US juniors to make the A Final in the coastal solo events.
Each won their time trial on Friday, claiming the route of the top seed into the final round, but came away with silver against more experienced scullers in the final. Anderson ran into the strong home country sculler and European champion Lucio Fugazzotto of Italy, while Hahl faced off with Tunisia's Hela Belhaje Mohamed, the reigning World Champion who has never lost a Beach Sprints singles final.
"Rowing in the solo was something completely new to me this year," said Anderson, who won a silver in the junior men's double last year. "I wasn't sure how I'd stack up against the world's best. My placement in the time trial gave me the confidence I needed to realize I had a chance. From there, it was just a race. Lots of split decisions, jumping early from the boat to catch up in a sprint, catching my oar after it flew out of my hand, getting back on my seat. I'm happy how things turned out."
As it happens, that final match-up against Fugazzotto was special one for Anderson: the two athletes became fast friends over the week of training, long before they knew for certain they would be the two battling for the gold.
"Lucio has been a good friend this past week. I first heard of him from watching the European coastal championships about a month back. He was the champion in the solo there as well, and I knew he would be a hard guy to beat. Sometimes the intensity of racing overshadows the fact that sports are made to be fun. I try to be friendly to everyone I race. They're my opponent, but I respect them. We're fighting for the same goals, and we've all worked so hard to get here.
"Lucio is such a kind guy. He's energetic, friendly, and loves to just talk to you. We wanted to see each other in the A final, and I'm glad we did. If it wasn't going to be me to win, I'm glad it was him. He deserves all of the glory that he has earned."
Hahl, who won a bronze in the double last year in her Beach Sprints debut, bested Sweden and then a strong Egyptian sculler in Hannah Elsobky, who had made the B Final last year, before running into the Tunisian, Belhaje Mohamed.
Both Hahl and Belhaje Mohamed had also raced for their nations this year at the flat water U19 Worlds, though on opposite sides of the draw so they did face each other, with Hahl making the B Final in Paris and Belhaje Mohamed the D Final. On the beach, though, the Tunisian has been literally unbeatable so far. While Hahl made it close on the water coming into the beach, Belhaje Mohamed sprinted away to claim her third gold medal in a row--a three-peat she was delighted with on the podium.
"That was incredible," Hahl told USRowing afterwards. "I honestly came here - I didn't know what to expect. I had never raced the coastal single before. I've mostly been in the double with Annalie [Duncomb]. It was just exciting to get out there and show everyone what I could do. It was definitely getting more challenging as we went on because the surf picked up a bit in the wind, but I think I controlled myself the best I could, and I'm happy with what I did."
Cavallo Back on the Beach, Bagging Bronze
On the final day of racing, Christine Cavallo added a third singles medal to the total: after losing out in the semi to French Olympic double sculler Elodie Ravera-Scaramozzino, Cavallo beat another Tokyo 202One athlete, Ireland's Monika Dukarska, for her second Beach Sprints bronze.
Cavallo, who won her first bronze in the mixed quad on the 2021 Beach Sprints team, and then took a year away to study at Oxford and do the Boat Race in 2022, has been "all in" on coastal since, earning spots in the single and the double with Rogers on both this team and the squad that would have contested the now-cancelled World Beach Games team.
"The single was a blast," Cavallo said, even though she did not think the conditions after the day's wait were that much better (and you can see what she meant in this sequence of photos).
"My body held on for the extra day and I felt really good going into this morning. The conditions dealt everyone some tough hands throughout the bracket but I lucked out and managed to pull off a win in the B final, which earned me a bronze.
"The whole weekend was an awesome display of all that Beach Sprints has to offer," she added. "I think every athlete could find a set of conditions that favored them and the finals days all played to the hands of athletes who did the technical work in training."
Cavallo had also high hopes for a medal in the double with Rogers, but talked about how the schedule, and the prolonged run by quad to the gold, with Rogers at stroke, played a role.
"The double was a tough ask. Kory and I made the decision early in the season to stick together after seeing how fast we were. We knew that this would most likely be the last time we could double up given how much the competition is elevating each year. The schedule came out afterwards, and left Kory with two events back to back.
"He was stroking the quad, and they had a gold medal on the line. When that's in front of you in a knock-out bracket like this you have to go for it. But it left him with four minutes of rest until our top seed spot in the mixed double was set to go off."
"I'm glad we took the risk and a bit bummed we couldn't cash in on the full speed we were capable of, but there's no point when we had information that would have caused us to act differently. I'm proud of the decisions we made at each point of this season."
Junior Double Makes it Four A Finals for US
The high point of that last, extra day for the US came when the junior mixed double of Britt Wotovich and Malachi Anderson made the A Final, beating a Spanish double with returning gold medalist Marcos Delgado Marquez aboard. It was the USA's fourth A Final of the regatta, and the duo took the silver there in a tight, dramatic duel with Britain's Isabel Lancaster and Jonathan Martini.
The final was a wild race, with the US crew making a navigation mistake in the surf and then GB turning and capsizing on the final strokes. GB's Martini, running out of the deeper water, reached the buzzer just 6/100ths behind Anderson, but a 30 second steering penalty against the Americans gave GB the gold.
Wotovich, the only junior on the team who has competed at all three Beach Sprints, spoke from her experience about the conditions and the races getting delayed to Monday.
"I have learned to expect the unexpected in coastal rowing and this weekend was no exception," Wotovich said.
"I was disappointed our race was postponed due to 'overly coastal conditions' because we were ready to race and had several practice sessions in wavy conditions following the Florida hurricane, but safety should always come first.
"The delay in the racing schedule worked to our advantage, and allowed us to both be fresh for the full progression," Wotovich said.
"I am proud of how hard Malachi and I worked in preparation for the event despite living over 1000 miles apart," she added. "Our finals progression today had eight strong teams that I am so honored to have competed against. The future of coastal rowing is truly exciting!"
For Anderson, making the A Final in both events meant he raced the maximum number of times possible without having a repechage or second time trial round.
"I was a little worried about double racing this year," he said when it was over. "I knew each event has its own challenges, and it would be a tiring weekend. But regardless of that, I'm so happy I chose to race two events. Everything worked out just like my coach said it would. My body is bruised, and my feet hurt more than I ever expected, but I'm happy.
Anderson noted that while the single was a new event for him this year, the double was not:
"In the double, I had much more experience. I rowed in the Junior Men's double last year, and I've trained multiple weeks in Florida with my partner, trying to go out in all conditions to get as much speed as possible."
"One thing I wish that we did more is race," he added, echoing the point his coach Marc Oria mentioned in our row2k interview last week about the need for a coastal racing season in the US.
"As much as we would train," said Anderson, "it was never a real race scenario. There was nobody to race. Things get a lot harder when your arms don't work anymore, and you're in the last race of your progression."
Notes from the Beach
How rough is too rough? - this seems to be an on-going question for the event, and this year was the second Beach Sprint Finals in a row where races were cancelled, affected, or moved altogether because the conditions got a bit too coastal.
While the boats are designed for heavy surf and the athletes are skilled enough to handle some pretty gnarly water, there does come a point when it becomes unsafe, particularly for the smaller singles and doubles which feature in all but one Beach Sprints event.
When this year's races were halted on Sunday, World Rowing sent out some test boats with modifications to see if conditions could be managed with extra safety measures--which included athletes wearing helmets not unlike whitewater kayakers--but made the decision to postpone the remaining racing to the planned weather day on Monday.
Of course, coastal races are events where conditions, and the ability to handle them with skillful rowing, are supposed to be a factor, but it will be interesting to see what adjustments are made year to year to the schedule, venue selection, or the equipment itself, as World Rowing tweaks Beach Sprints ahead of the hoped-for Olympic inclusion at the LA Games in 2028.
And What About Olympic Beach Sprinting? - row2k learned at Worlds in Belgrade that World Rowing is still waiting on the IOC to make an announcement about whether Beach Sprints will be part of the 2028 Olympics. They had hoped to have the news in time to share it in Belgrade, but the IOC is holding off on revealing the decision until they can announce all the new sports for 2028 across the entire Olympic program, which should come at some point this fall. So the wait continues, but it does seem that the World Rowing brass is pretty confident it will be good news, and that they will get the opportunity to add the 'wild cousin' of classic rowing to those LA Games in the near future.
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