Last week's Senior National Team Trials completed the US squad for the 2023 World Championships in Belgrade this coming September. Seven crews earned spots on the team in Saturday's finals by winning and hitting 94% of the published "Competitive Standard Time" for their event. Three crews failed to meet the time standard--the Light Men's Pair, Light Women's Quad, and the PR3 Women's Pair--so the US will not field entries in those events this year.
Bound for Belgrade, and joining the crews named from the Selection camps or picked by virtue of winning the NSR and doing well enough at the Varese World Cup to earn a berth, will be Finn Putnam in the Men's Single, Sophia Vitas and Kristi Wagner in the Women's Double, Even Olson and William Bender in the Men's Pair, Sophia Luwis in the Women's Light Single, Sam Melvin in the Men's Light Single, Solveig Imsdahl and Elaine Tierney in the Women's Light Pair, and the Light Men's quad of Casey Howshall, Ian Richardson, Bernard Aparicio, and Jamie Copus.
The Belgrade Worlds will offer the first opportunity to qualify boats for the Olympics, so that will be the goal for three Trials winners in the Olympic boat classes: Putnam in the single, the Olson/Bender pair, and the Vitas/Wagner double--a combo which finished fifth at Worlds last year and recently won a World Cup silver in Varese just inches behind the Chinese.
Women's Double
Vitas and Wagner's medal in Varese did not earn them a spot at Worlds because the two had rowed in different boats at the NSR back at the end of April, but the two emerged as the fastest combination during selection camp and have been back in their 'reunited' lineup ever since.
"We are very happy to have officially made the team," said Wagner afterwards; this will be the third team for both the Tokyo 202One Olympian and for Vitas.
"We’ve been training with Michelle Sechser and Mary Jones Nabel [the recently names Light Women's double, eds.] and Andrew Gaard in the single a bit, which has been great," added Wagner. "Everyone pushes each other but we also know when to give either boat space."
"I’m grateful to be part of such a great training group and excited to get back to it on Monday because we all need to pick up some more speed in the next month or so."
The Light Women's Double also raced the Trials, finishing second behind Vitas and Wagner, and ahead of the double headed to the Pan Am Games in October, Maddy Focht and Veronica Nicacio.
Men's Single
Finn Putnam, racing for the New York AC, earned his first Senior Worlds berth when he took the win in the single. His previous senior team experience was in the Men's Quad at the Final Olympic Qualifier in 2021, but the crew did not make it to Tokyo.
"The regatta went as I planned," said Putnam. "My goal was to save as much energy as possible in the time trial through semifinal so that I could execute a full effort in the final, and I was able to do so."
"Training has been really great this summer on the Charles. I just finished my second year of law school and have been working full time this summer, so I’ve been training mostly solo in Boston, but that’s allowed me to really work on the things that I needed to do better to move a boat."
Light Women's Single
Sophia Luwis, who has been racing the the Light Single all summer for the US at World Cups--collecting silver in Varese and gold in Lucerne--made her spot official with her win on Saturday. Having missed Worlds last year when she and a teammate were involved in a car accident just before the team left for Racice, this will be her first trip to Worlds and completes her comeback from the accident.
"I was super nervous beforehand," Luwis told USRowing, "even more so than all the Europe racing, because this one really meant something and there was something coming after it.
"All the world cup events – you want to do well, you want to perform and represent the U.S. well, but this one – if you don't do well, you don't get to keep progressing, so I felt that pressure a little bit. Because so much happens right when you get off the water from boat weighing to doping control, it hasn't really sunk in. I had a brief moment of 'Holy ... I made the team,' but I think it will settle in more throughout the rest of the day."
"Today's racing was awesome to be a part of for so many reasons, Luwis told row2k later. "I had a lot more nerves to deal with for this race due to it being a trial event and not just a race for medals. Thankfully, whenever I actually get into the starting blocks, I tend to forget all of that and just think about the racing and it was good, solid racing from everyone. I’m looking forward to a few days off, but even more excited to get back overseas and be back to race prep mode."
Light Men's Single
Sam Melvin will also make his first trip to Senior Worlds, earning the chance to race the event he won at the U23 level in 2019, the Light Men's Single.
"I was really happy with the piece that I was able to put down," Melvin said. "A new focus for me has been to just go off of feeling and not be too focused on splits or stroke rate. I'm trying to gauge my speed just running off feeling and my perceived level of exertion, and that worked out pretty well. I didn't think too hard about it and it was a good piece. I was able to get a good baseline and I can work off of in my prep for Worlds."
"Winning these trials is a really big deal for me personally, because the last time I was on the team was U23s and that was four years ago in 2019. I think I had a pretty good career as a U23, but after I finished as a U23 I started to have a lot of issues and injuries that put me out of the sport for over a year. I was struggling for a really long time to figure out how to get over that hurdle. And then I finally figured things out and got support from a lot of people that I definitely wouldn't have been able to make this return without.
"After I got back into the sport, it took a long time to really get back to the previous speed I'd been showing. But now, I feel like I've definitely gotten to the point where I'm putting down the fastest times I've ever put down and I'm back at my peak again. So, it feels awesome to be the fastest I've ever been and to make my first team in four years and my first senior team is especially significant just for those reasons."
Up Next
You can read up on all the crews and line-ups headed to Worlds at this catch-all page we put together. The Championships will run from September 3rd to the 10th, and you can read about the Olympic Qualification details here.
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