Synek races C Final at Rowing World Cup II

Cloudy conditions had temperatures around 25 degrees and gentle easterly wind caused head-cross wind conditions. Featuring in the men’s single C Final was Ondrej Synek of the Czech Republic. Synek finished last season as number three in the world, but he has struggled to find form this year and finished out of the medals at the first Rowing World Cup last month. Today he took off in the lead of the c-final and created an open water gap between Jaakko Hasu of Finland and Ralph Kreibich of Austria who were fighting for second. Synek kept the pressure on until the end with a solid 37 strokes per minute showing that when he’s in front, he’s happy to dominate.

To follow are highlights of this morning’s races.

Lightweight Women Single Scull (LW1x) – Semifinal

Opening the day, these 59kg maximum weight women raced for a top three spot that would take them through to this evening’s final. Leading semi-final one was Berit Carow of Germany. This is Carow’s first time competing internationally in the single (at Munich she finished second in the double) and she is part of a squad under coach Meinhard Rahn all vying for the lightweight double. Also coming from the double (and Munich’s winner) China’s Hua Yu finished second with Coralie Ribeil of France qualifying for the final from third.

A starting lead by France’s Clemence Willaume was soon lost to Katrin Olsen of Denmark in the second semi-final. A very close battle between Michaela Taupe of Austria and Switzerland’s Pamela Weisshaupt swept them past Willaume and at the line it was Olsen, Taupe and Weisshaupt that will advance to the final. Unlucky Willaume will go not join her compatriot, Ribeil, in the final despite beating her yesterday in the repechage. Instead she will race the B-final.

Lightweight men’s single (LM1x) – Repechages

France’s lightweight double and fours, out due to illness, left it up to their fellow squad members, Maxime Goisset and Bastien Tabourier to wave the lightweight flag for their country and that is exactly what they did. Keeping the game alive, first Goisset led repechage one with a very close race going on behind him between Australia’s Tim Smith and Lukas Babac of Slovakia.

With Goisset in the lead, Smith and Babac were level pegging towards the line, fighting for the final qualifying spot. But disaster then struck for Babac. Rating 38, Babac caught a crab just 10 strokes from the line giving Smith the qualifying position. Babac will come back for the B Final.

France did it again in repechage two when Tabourier took off ahead of the Czech Republic’s Michal Vabrousek. Tabourier is in his second international season, while Vabrousek had two Olympics and World Champion titles to his name. Still, in a photo finish, Tabourier took line honours and both will advance to the final.

More semifinals and repechages to follow this afternoon.