Few surprises in Great Britain’s squad announcement

The British Rowing team won nine Olympic-class medals at last year’s World Rowing Championships in Karapiro, New Zealand, and the changes to crews from 2010 amount to little more than slight tweaking for the majority of the boats.

Olympic Champion Tom James, 27, is part of the tweaking. He has worked his way back into the squad after taking time off following the Beijing Olympics where he won gold in the men’s four. James joins the squad back in the four which has caused Alex Partridge to be moved into the men’s eight. Partridge won silver in the eight at the Beijing Olympics but since then he has been racing in the four. Nathaniel Reilly O’Donnell is also new this year to the eight.

Despite speculation that Great Britain’s two top male sweep rowers, Peter Reed and Andrew Triggs Hodge, may be added to the four, this has not been the case. Reed and Triggs Hodge remain in the men’s pair where they have consistently finished second to New Zealand over the past two years. 

Current World Champions in the women’s double sculls Katherine Grainger and Anna Watkins are no surprises to be back in the double again. Watkins and Grainger finished one-two respectively in the last two British single sculls trials and putting them in the double clearly indicates that this is the flagship boat for the women. 

Lightweight men’s double sculls World Champions, Zac Purchase and Mark Hunter stay together this season. Hunter’s position, however, was not always a sure thing after he finished fourth in the lightweight single at the last trials. Hunter faced stiff competition from Rob Williams, but he subsequently proved his worth and a spot in the double. Williams remains in the lightweight men’s four. 

The women’s quadruple sculls continues as Annie Vernon, Beth Rodford, Frances Houghton and Debbie Flood. This is the same line-up that took gold last year at the World Rowing Championships. 

The women’s pair also remains the same as 2010 with Heather Stanning and Helen Glover staying together. The duo were silver medallists last year. The women’s eight, however, sees two positions change from their 2010 line-up that finished fourth at the World Rowing Championships. Emily Taylor and Katie Solesbury come into the boat replacing Victoria Thornley and Olivia Whitlam. 

Matthew Wells and Marcus Bateman remain in the men’s double sculls. They were silver medallists at last year’s World Rowing Championships. Alan Campbell remains the unchallenged man in the men’s single scull. 

Rounding out the sculling boats, the men’s quadruple sculls welcomes Tom Solesbury to the boat. Solesbury is the husband of, women’s eight team member, Katie. He will join Sam Townsend, Bill Lucas and Stephan Rowbotham.

The lightweight women’s double sculls remains with Hester Goodsell and Sophie Hosking in the boat.

For the full team click here