Amsterdam finals establish new benchmark

The first day of finals at the 2011 World Rowing Under 23 Championships in Amsterdam, the Netherlands saw a whole range of new World Best Times being set as crews enjoyed tailwind conditions and a jump in competitiveness at the biggest World Rowing Under 23 Championships ever.

The United States women’s pair of Grace Luczak and Felice Mueller made the biggest impression by beating the World Best Time by a whopping nine seconds. What was more impressive, Luczak and Mueller did it without being pushed by any other crew. This was just one of seven World Best Times set today on the Bosbaan.  

Men’s Coxless Four (BM4-)

What a way to end the A Finals on Saturday! This was always going to be a neck and neck dual between Germany and Italy, the two boats emerging the strongest after the heats and semi-finals. Italy, defending champions, set the World Best Time in the heats of 5.52.57, in much slower conditions than were present today and looked to be favourites. Yet, Germany were not going to  let them have it.

Italy had a cracking start, racing ahead of the field to the 750m. Germany, digging deep through the middle 500m, came right back at them, and the pair raced alongside each other, watching closely. It was Germany who made the decisive move with 500m to go, and gained three quarters of a length over the spirited Italians. Roars from the grandstand willed the Germans home, and it looked as though the gold medal was theirs. Italy put in one last do-or-die attempt to overhaul them, and it almost worked. Coming within a bowball distance, Italy threw everything at the Germans in the final 100m but the German boat had enough nerve to hold them off, crossing the line in a new World Best Time of 5.48.12. Heads down in the Italian boat as they lose not only their title of World Champions, but also their World Best Time.

Behind these two, there were four boats vying for third at the halfway point, before Greece upped the rate of striking and made their move into bronze position over Canada.

Results: GER, ITA, GRE, CAN, ESP, USA

Kay Rueckbrodt (GER) – Gold:
“The race was fantastic, it’s a dream. The start was good and the whole race was a very tight race against the Italians. One of us shouted: ‘Come on, we’re winning’, and at that moment we pushed as hard as we could.”

Marco Di Costanzo (ITA) – Silver:
“We fought a terrible fight with Germany. We tried to attack till the end. My compliments to Germany.”

Michalis Nastopoulos (GRE) – Bronze:
“When arriving in the Netherlands we did not expect much, we are a young team. But during the tournament we knew we could win a medal- and so we did!”

The rest of the story here: worldrowing.com