Junior Men’s Four (JM4-) – Semifinals

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Jaime Lara Pacheco (S), Pau Franquet Montfort (3), Sergio Garcia Sanjulian (2) and Gil Marco Sardelli (B) of Spain start to pull in the Canadians after their very quick start in the Junior Men’s Fours at the 2011 World Rowing Junior Championships in Eton, Great Britain

The tension and excitement was apparent when semifinal one opened with a false start. The United States got the yellow card, breaking the start just a fraction too soon. In the second attempt, Serbia got off the line the best but there was very little between all six boats. By the middle of the race, Serbia was still in the lead with Great Britain (silver in 2010) and reigning World Champions, Romania pressing hard. As the last quarter of the race came into view Belarus suddenly came through to challenge the leaders. Ratings got up to 40 strokes per minute with the crowd in the edge of their seat as Great Britain’s qualifying position got challenged. In a huge surge Belarus managed to just pip Great Britain and nearly catch Serbia who had been overtaken by Romania in the final sprint. A heartbroken Great Britain drifted over the line.

Germany made no bones about their intention right from the start; they took the lead and held on to it for the entire 2000m in semifinal two. Behind the Germans, Spain slotted into second keeping the heat on the Germans, whilst Croatia held on to third. Unlike semifinal one, the order did not change right to the line and Germany, Spain and Croatia are the crews that will go to the final.

Qualifiers: ROU, SRB, BLR, GER, ESP, CRO

Junior Women’s Quadruple Sculls (JW4x) – Semifinals

At the start there was barely a bow ball separating the Netherlands, Belarus and Romania in semifinal one. By the half way

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Australia’s Leah Saunders (S), Sarah Zillmann (3), Jessie Allen (2) and Molly Goodman (B) racing in the Junior Women’s Quadruple Sculls semifinals at the 2011 Junior World Rowing Championships in Eton, Britain

point Romania had taken the lead with Belarus and the Netherlands following closely. Romania came to this semifinal the hard way by racing in the repechages yesterday. But the Romanian’s were looking strong despite this extra race and continued to lead by clear water by the end of the race. Coming into the finish the real drama was going on for the lesser spots. Belarus, the Netherlands, Great Britain and New Zealand all crossed the line together. It took the finishing judges to decide the order. Belarus and the Netherlands had done it. Great Britain had missed out by 1/10th of a second and New Zealand not much more.

The reigning World Champions, Germany showed their dominating form in semifinal two. Kreutzer, Kroll, Schulz and Brockmann got out first at the start and remained there. Italy tried very hard to challenge but it looked like they were running out of steam in the second half of the race. This gave the United States a chance to show what they were made of. The USA were able to push through to take second behind Germany with Italy, having done enough in the first half of the race, holding on to third. Italy’s stroke, Cecilia Bellati had to be helped out of the boat at the finish. There is no doubt about the effort being exerted by these athletes.

Qualifiers: ROU, BLR, NED, GER, USA, ITA