As the dust settles after the second NSR, winners of four of the five Olympic-qualified events will join Michelle Guerette in racing in the World Cup series to race for a position on the 2008 US Olympic rowing team. Only the winning men's double of Matt Hughes and Sam Stitt declined the World Cup opportunity, opting instead to go for a seat in the men's quad.
The crews, required results and guidelines are as follows:
Find full selection procedures here: http://www.usrowing.org/News_Media/2008OlympicGames/08olselexp.aspx.
There was more at stake in the racing than just the top spot; in the men's pairs, for example, members of the finalist pairs were automatically included in the continuing selection for the team boats. With the women's pairs, a number of crew members will race at the Munich World Cup, then a selection of those athletes will race again at the Lucerne World Cup that concludes June 1.
The light men's doubles event was a bit of an odd bird at NSR2, as at least a couple potentially contending light men's double opted to double up on events to row up a class in the heavyweight event. This was due in part to the fully "open trials" nature of the light doubles at the National Selection Regattas - participation in the trials is not contingent on results or even participation at either NSR. In the end, Mike Aller and Gavin Frase led the field by a chunk of open water at the finish line, followed by Bjorn Larsen/Rich Montgomery and Dan Urevick-ackelsberg/Shane Madden in tight formation.
Not as odd as the women's lightweight double, tho, which provides a full backstory in itself. The second NSR has long been known to carry a purse of $4000 for the winner of the light women's event. All of the current lightweight doubles ended up entering the open women's event, however, each for varied and different reasons. In the end there was only one entry, consisting of a former one-year collegiate rower, and a former collegiate sweep rower turned novice sculler (editor's note: this corrects the original description as "novice oarswoman:" we apologize for the error). The crew rowed uncontested, covering the course in 9:18 in a cross tailwind, rowing away with the event, and the purse.
To return to the actual contest for the LW2x berth, why did so many light women's crews opt to row in the open event, particularly with money on the line? As suggested above, remember that the trials for this event takes place May 12-17, just a couple weeks hence. It is entirely reasonable, and probably even advisable, not to want to make weight for three days running only a couple weeks before the trials for the event. It's a long, long summer for these folks - NSR this past weekend, trials the week after next, maybe a World Cup, definitely the final do-or-die Olympic qualifier, and then, well, the Olympics proper. Some might even have simply wanted a genuine shot at winning the open double. Anyway, once a couple contenders decided to row in the open race, there would naturally be some follow-the-leader so you could get a race against the actual competition. Overall, I would say it was a good decision.
Onward, from odd birds to old birds: The Ashland Rowing comeback crew of Steve Keisling (of Shell Game fame) and Andy Baxter found the young 'uns a bit much to handle, finishing about 45 seconds off the pace in both the time trial and the heat, and decided to pack it in before the Final 3 took place. Note that the crew borrowed a pair and oars from a local Rude Dog duo consisting of a Yale and a Harvard oarsman, and the sweep oars they loaned are painted Yale colors on the port side, Harvard colors on the starboard side. Yale grad Keisling was lucky he rows starboard, lest he be forced to row with a Crimson blade. Anyway, in the end the grey hairs gave it a shot, what the heck, even made our Crew of the Week poll - and we can probably take solace that the the potential book release may be a little quicker read than the boat...
Finally, and to all a good night: It was an interesting night out on the pontoons for row2k. First a 45-foot wooden pontoon was loose; row2k tied it off, called launches in, got the thing lined back up, stood in the water to tilt the docks so the pontoon would fit under the dock; eventually five launches showed up to perform the last step of shoving the thing under the dock. Next, serve as instant dockmaster for first five races working with the aligner, answer all the athlete questions about delays and lanes while the starting folks were trying to figure out lane reassignments, test and fix the audio system, help test and fix the lighting system, and in between take all the photos you see on row2k. Hey, no problem, I've done this same array of tasks at least a dozen times before out on Mercer, and at least it's something to do. However... to close out the night, when the last race went off at 7:40, two launches came out, and, without enough seats for everyone to get home, all the refs and half the stakeboat kids were loaded up and shuttled back - and that was it. No additional launches were sent out - after night fell out in the middle of the lake, it became clear no one was coming back out, and a call was made to the boathouse. In the end three teenagers and your correspondent stood out on the pontoons for one full half hour after the end of racing, and got back on land well after dark. The media liaison thought it was hilarious. Really quite a pleasure to provide the help and amusement. Little wonder there's no media except row2k covering these races, eh?
The next big races in the quest to reach the 2008 Games takes place over the stretch of May 8-17, with the Munich World Cup stop May 8-11, and the Non-Qualified Small Boats Trials on Mercer Lake May 12-17. See you on the pontoons, and pick us up if you see us stuck out there!
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