"VAN" (Sports Desk - 14.04.2024) :: Great Britain and Italy secured the first gold medals of the international regatta season on day 2 of 2024 World Rowing Cup I in Varese on Saturday, as finalists were confirmed in other events.
Britain’s Olivia Bates won her first international gold medal with an assured performance in the final of the lightweight women’s single sculls, ahead of Norway’s Maia Lund and the Netherlands’ Tosca Kettler.
Bates is in her first season as a full-time athlete, and showed composure throughout the race to win in 7:41.82.
Patrick Rocek of Italy pulled clear of the field in the lightweight men’s single sculls final and was able to hold off Germany’s Arno Gaus to take the win. Gaus produced the fastest second 1000m of the field for silver, with 18-year-old Peter Strecansky of Slovakia adding World Rowing Cup bronze to the men’s single sculls title he won at the 2023 World Rowing Under 19 Championships.
Gaus’s medal was particularly impressive as he had raced just 40 minutes earlier in the repechage of the men’s quadruple sculls, having been subbed in for Tim Ole Naske ahead of the start of the regatta on Friday.
Elsewhere, the morning’s racing confirmed the remaining participants in Sunday’s A-finals for the 14 Olympic events on offer. There were several sprint finishes in the dashes for the line and the places on offer, and a number of experienced crews were relegated to B-finals.
Those missing out included Ireland’s Ross Corrigan and Nathan Timoney, bronze medallists in the men’s pair at the 2023 World Rowing Championships. They did not have the speed to stick with Olympic bronze medallists Frederic Vystavel and Joachim Sutton of Denmark, who led out the first repechage ahead of Italy 1.
But Olympic men’s pair champions Martin and Valent Sinkovic made it safely through to the final, although they were beaten by Great Britain 2 – a new combination, with the experience of former men’s four world champion Will Stewart on board.
Ukraine’s men’s four were fourth at the 1500m mark in their repechage, but made a decisive move that took them through both Ireland and Denmark to finish second behind the Netherlands. They edged out Denmark by only 0.05 seconds in the tightest finish of the day.
Reigning single sculls world champions Karolien Florijn (Netherlands) and Oliver Zeidler (Germany) both look like they will continue their winning streaks in tomorrow’s finals, with comfortable semifinal victories on Saturday. Florijn will be joined in the final by former world champion Sanita Puspure of Ireland, who continued her comeback in this boat class with a second place finish in her semifinal.
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