Rowing FISA World Championships 2022

[Makedonas 2,155]

I'm copying @OlympicIRLhere and doing the same for the Greek team 

 

Overall picture:

 

3 A-Finals in Olympic class events

1 silver and 1 5th place in non-Olympic class events

 

If we were to project forward 12 months, 3 boats would qualify to Paris 2024 if they replicate these results at the next World Championships. It's also important to note that our men's lightweight double sculls and women's pair would have very good chances as well in my opinion (we did not send crews to Racice for those boats).

 

As I mentioned before Fragkou/Natsioula are super young and for various reasons were not well-prepared for these Championships. If they stick together I think they'll improve a lot over the next 12-18 months and qualify for Paris. Fragkou won gold this year in the women's pair at both the World U23s and European U23s, while Natsioula won gold in the women's double at the European U19s, World U19s (with a world's best time), and European U23s. Together they rowed twice in the past, winning bronze in 2020 at the European U19s, and gold in 2021 at the European U19s, so this was actually the first time they didn't win a medal together.

 

Papakonstantinou won silver in the men's lightweight single and also won gold in that event last month at the European Championships. He is only 23 yo and has a lot of experience and has won a lot of medals at the U23 level. For example, last year he won gold in the men's lightweight single at the World U23s. Obviously he needs a good partner to compete in the lightweight double as the lightweight single is not an Olympic event. 21 yo Petros Gkaidatzis won gold three weeks ago in the men's lightweight single at the European U23s. Him and Papakonstantinou have rowed together in the past, winning gold in the men's lightweight double at the 2019 European U23s.

 

I think we'll qualify in the women's pair. In Tokyo we had 20 yos Christina Bourmpou and Maria Kyridou finish 5th in the A Final. Neither competed here in Racice as they both study in the United States and had to go back. Bourmpou won gold this summer at the World U23s and European U23s, but had a disappointing European Championships where she finished 6th (with Kyridou they won bronze in 2020 and got 4th in 2021). Kyridou did not compete for the national team this year as her and her sister Anneta (who finished 10th in the women's single in Tokyo as a 22 yo) were suspended from the national team for one year. They are actually training to compete together in the pair...

 

...which means we have 3 girls but only two spots, which opens up the door for a possible women's four as well...perhaps Fragkou can join them and then Dalidou (gold in W2X at European U19s and World U19s this year) or Gkogkou (gold in W1X at European U19s and World U19s this year) could join Natsioula in the double (and the other can try in the single perhaps)...or we can have both a pair and a four, we also have Argyraki/Asvesta who together in the women's pair won gold at both the European U19s and World U19s this year...plus we have Aspasia Christodoulidis who just won her second consecutive NCAA Championships and recently graduated, or Dimitra Tsamopoulou who has also won an NCAA Championship and will be graduating this year and previously won gold for us at the World U23s with Kyridou in 2019.

 

We could also try to see if the lightweight rower Zoi Fitsiou (who was silver in LW1X at the Europeans and 5th here in Racice) can qualify in W1X...

 

We have a lot of options and need to figure out crews so that next year we can get as many Olympic quotas as possible. Of course a lot can change, for example last year we were not talking about Dalidou or Kontou and now both are on our radar, we'll probably have another one or two teenagers next year who we can consider.

 

I think we should aim to qualify M1X, M2X, W1X, LM2X, W2-, W2X, LW2X, W4-. Then we can also try another men's boat (maybe M2- or M4X) and if we can then W4X but I don't think we have enough athletes for that. It might even be more realistic to try to have some girls double up and qualify the W8+ which is something we have never attempted but seeing Romania and the Netherlands double up, it could be an option for us (though probably an unrealistic dream).

 

 

Event	Athlete(s)	Final	Place in Final	Overall Rank
Men's Single Sculls	Stefanos Ntouskos (25)	A	6th	6th   Top 9 next year Worlds qualify for Paris 2024
Men's Double Sculls	Ioannis Kalandaridis (24)  Athanasios Palaiopanos (23)	A	6th	6th   Top 11 next year Worlds qualify for Paris 2024
Women's Lightweight Double Sculls	Evangelia Anastasiadou (20)  Dimitra-Eleni Kontou (17)	A	6th	6th   Top 7 next year Worlds qualify for Paris 2024
Women's Double Sculls	Evangelia Fragkou (19)  Styliani Natsioula (17)	C	3rd	15th   Top 11 next year Worlds qualify for Paris 2024

[Joshi 123]

Meh, I'm not too worried about NZ's very mediocre and poor showing. A few medal winners at the olys have taken a gap year and some are still at varsity in the US and UK. But a nice wake up call for Rowing NZ HQ. But GB has turned all this around and it was expected to be honest.