With lots of hot racing and a couple of dead heats, the semi-finals have set the stage for the last round of Finals at the last chance Olympic qualifier. The US had a great morning, qualifying comfortably with each the last three crews looking for spots in the finals. The USA now has all six FQ crews in a position to race through to the Olympics, but safe to say the job is far from done as racing continues to tighten up.
The semi racing was moved up ahead of a dire weather forecast, and so this morning's races were just hours removed from Monday's delayed reps and, with both rounds getting down to the tough business of ending the Olympic hopes of the crews failing to advance, the racing was not without its drama, in the non-US crews at least. The Final Qualifier is an event without B Finals, so missing the cut means outright elimination, and some inspired racing throughout.
The Light Men's Double served up this quintessential Final Qualifier tableau in its second semi: with three to advance, there was a dead heat, photo finish for second (Austria) and third (Bulgaria), with Spain missing out on the final, and the Olympics, by tenths of a second. One of the Spanish scullers was so spent that he was removed from the boat by the medical team, leaving his partner to row back to the dock alone in defeat--but such are the stakes here in Lucerne.
Here is how things played out for the three US crews racing the semis:
Men’s Double
The US men’s double of Sam Stitt and Warren Anderson raced the entire length of their semifinal with almost zero separation between the top three crews. At the finish line, the US were actually tied with Azerbaijan for first (in the other dead heat of the morning), with China coming in a half-length behind. All three crews advance to tomorrow’s A Final, where top two will be the spots to chase for London.
“It was good; we were a little bit more collected than during our heat,” said Stitt following the race. "Today we were a lot more relaxed and approached it a little bit closer to our race plan and all together executed a perfect race. Warren did a really good job today in stroke seat.”
Those three crews will meet Italy, Latvia, and Ukraine in the final to battle for the two spots on offer for the Olympic Games. “Tomorrow’s going to be really close, really tight," Stitt added. "The Italians are doing well and it’s just going to be a really tight field. We’re just going to have to do our race plan and hit that last gear. Hit it hard in the last 500 and just blow it out.”
Women’s Single
Single sculler Gevvie Stone advanced out of her semifinal, finishing second behind Danish sculler Fie Udby Erichsen. Both women advance to tomorrow’s A Final, along with Estonian Kaisa Pajusalu. In that second semi, France's Sophie Balmary was in contention early, but faded to fourth to miss out on a chance to make her fourth Olympic Games. Erichsen, Stone, and Pajusalu will face scullers Australia's Kim Crow, Serbia's Iva Obradovic (a Cal grad), and Ireland's Sanita Puspure in the final. The top four finishers will qualify for London, which is a change FISA announced just a week ago when it allocated one additional spot to both the Women's and Men's singles fields.
“Today was a good race,” Stone said. “I’ll need to find another gear tomorrow and hopefully make top four!”
Lightweight Men’s Double
Andrew Campbell and Will Daly raced a strong semifinal and finished second to Hungary and will now move on to tomorrow’s final. “We went in to today knowing we had to come top three and that the Hungarians were going to be pretty fast, having done well in the first World Cup,” said Daly, following a cool down. “We wanted to go out and have a really solid first thousand and just see where we were for the second half. We ended up pretty comfortable behind the Hungarians by about a length and were pretty far up on everyone else, so we just held that the rest of the way. We didn’t sprint at all and were actually lower than we would normally be, lower than tomorrow for sure!”
That sets up a six boat final with Hungary and Switzerland from the US semi, and then Australia, Austria, and Bulgaria from the second semi. The top two crews in the A Final will punch their ticket for London. Daly added, “I think Australia and Hungary are going to be fast tomorrow, so tomorrow will be tough. There are only two slots so no one is going to be a slouch. We’re feeling really good and think we executed exactly what we wanted to do and are looking forward to tomorrow.”
Racing resumes in Lucerne at 11 EDT/9 PDT with Finals in the W2-, M2-, W2x (with USA), M4-, LW2x, LM4- (with USA), W4x, M4x, W8+, and M8+ (with USA).
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