In an early indicator that requiring testing for regattas will take some time to master, practicing ahead of the US Olympic Trials in Sarasota was postponed last night while some athletes waited on test results to arrive. It was determined to be a competitive disadvantage not to be able to train, so all practice in events with an affected athlete was postponed.
Update: some events were approved for practice later on Saturday morning.
On Friday afternoon, USRowing Chief High Performance Officer Matt Imes mentioned to row2k that the storms and FedEx outages at hubs like Memphis were causing serious issues for the delivery of test results.
In an email sent Friday night, USRowing informed athletes that practice for Saturday morning would be cancelled.
USRowing, in conjunction with the High Performance Committee, USRowing AAC Reps, and discussions with the USOPC, have determined that being unable to practice in an event due to the lack of a result from a PCR pre-test, and having followed the proper timeline to obtain that test, poses a competitive disadvantage for those athletes at this stage.
Therefore, it has been determined that events will not be allowed to practice on water at the venue until it has been cleared to practice.
USRowing will determine at 6:00 a.m. if an event will be allowed to practice that day. We are waiting until this time to allow as many test results to process as possible. If this should happen sooner we will notify accordingly. Notification will come by email to this list and the trials Whats App group to those subscribed.
At this time, no events have been cleared to practice on water at the venue tomorrow morning.
Ideally, access for all will be available Sunday morning. USRowing has taken additional steps to help ensure that is the case.
Accredited athletes and coaches will have access to the venue to retrieve equipment if they wish to practice off-site during regatta hours. Additionally, these athletes will have access to the ergs during these hours. USRowing is working to establish ergometer access times for athletes who have not yet been cleared to be accredited and will update these times by tomorrow at 8 a.m.
If you are non-accredited, want to move your equipment off-site for practice and your coach or team is unable to move the equipment for you, contact USRowing staff to assist you.
Thank you for your patience as we navigate these circumstances.
Comments | Log in to comment |
There are no Comments yet
|
row2k's Olympics coverage is brought to you by:
row2k's Olympics coverage is brought to you by: