Rowing 2021 Discussion Thread

[Makedonas 2,239]

No  just like last month's U23 Euros, and also no  either.

 

Greece with 16 athletes, 7 boats. Some surprises with athletes who made A Finals at the World Juniors this year not being selected.

 

Interesting to see 17 yo Eleni Leventelli finally competing in her age group, after competing at the U23 level two years in a row. She will be in the women's single sculls, after winning bronze in the women's lightweight single sculls at the European U23s last month (just over one second away from gold). I think she'll make the A Final and hopefully she can sneak a bronze but it will be tricky. The Swiss girl has been on fire this year. Leventelli will have another chance next year also.

 

Fragkou/Natsioula won bronze last year here and honestly they should be the favourites for gold in the women's double. Fragkou won three medals in three regattas this year, all with different crews, so this should be her fourth medal of the year.

 

Our women's four only has two of the same girls from last year's silver medal team. Not sure what to expect because with three of the same girls from last year they only got 6th at this year's World Juniors. Still, there are only five crews here in this event so a good chance to win a medal regardless 

 

No idea what to expect in the men's pair as we are sending new faces, and Iasonas Exarchou in the men's single sculls probably has a chance to win a medal (he was 9th at the World Juniors but silver at the European U23s in the men's double).

 

Our men's four got 5th at the World Juniors and we have the same team here and with the gold medalists not competing we have a decent chance at bronze or something (we were only 0.09 seconds behind 4th place there).

 

I also think we can have a chance in the men's double but there is so much depth in that event with 17 boats, it will be tough and hard to predict with inexperienced rowers. Generally the men's events are tougher to predict (at least from a Greek POV) because we have more new rowers, whereas most of the women already competed in several big regattas so we know their potential.

[Makedonas 2,239]

Great first day for Greece. All 7 of our crews advanced. Last year we won three medals (JM2X, JW2X, JW4-) and it looks like we will hopefully win medals in those three events once again, based on today's results at least. I also like our chances in JM1X and maybe JM2-.

 

I'm surprised we didn't send a crew for JW2- as I think we could've won a medal there as well with two of the other 2004 girls Argyraki/Asvesta/Gkogkou.

[Makedonas 2,239]

So in the end just two medals for us, but our first gold since 2018 (we won 3 medals in both 2019 and 2020 but no gold).

 

Fragkou/Natsioula won gold easily in the women's double, as expected I guess. They won bronze last year here, and I think both will have good chances to make it to Paris (whether in the same boat or not). Fragkou had an incredible 2021. Bronze at the World U23s with Arabatzi in the double, bronze at the World juniors in the single, gold at the European U23s with Anastasiadou and now gold at the European juniors with Natsioula. Now she is done with the junior category and I expect that next year she will also make her debut in the senior category in addition to competing at the U23 level, and that Natsioula will win medals at both the junior and U23 categories (though the World U23s and World juniors will be held simultaneously so she can only compete in one of those I guess).

 

And bronze for us in the women’s four. We won silver last year with two of the same rowers, and I was hoping for a repeat since we finished second in the preliminary race, but we caught a crab which was costly. Still, great to see Greek women win another medal in a four-person boat. We had won a lot of medals and one and two-person boats over the last 15 years or so (and men’s medals in four-person boats), but nothing since 2007 in a four-person boat until 2019 and now this is the third consecutive year that we did it. Two of our four girls will be eligible to compete as juniors again next year, so hopefully we can continue this streak. And even though there were only four boats in the race, Romania and Italy both won medals at the World juniors this year so it was quite a high level. Also nice to see Lemonia Makrygianni win bronze after her brother won bronze in the men’s double last year at this regatta.

 

5th place for Eleni Leventelli in the women’s single. I thought she would either win bronze or finish 4th but I didn’t expect the Latvian to win a medal. Still a decent performance for her, she is the only one from the A Final who will still be a junior next year so she can win a medal then.

 

Also 5th for Iasonas Exarchou in the men’s single and for our men’s double. A bit disappointing that neither of these boats could win medals, I was thinking at least one could, and also they are all in their last year as juniors so it’s not like Leventelli’s case where next year she’ll have a great chance to reach the podium. Aside from Ntouskos’ historic gold in Rio, it really wasn’t a good year for our male rowers. Our two golds at the World U23s were from rowers in their last year at the U23 level, and we only won one silver at the European U23s from a men’s crew and that was the men’s double where one of the rowers was in his last year as a U23. Hopefully next year will be better for our men but it’s concerning.

 

Disappointed that our men’s pair and men’s four finished 4th in their semifinals, especially the pair as they were super close to making the final, but these were the boats with the smallest chances to win medals for us anyways.

[hckošice 15,547]

I just saw in our national tv sports news that the Slovak federation has no National Team(s) seniors/juniors M, W etc.. from today. The federation decided unanimously to dissolve all Slovak National Teams (Representatives)

 

From the next season if anyone will be interested to represent the country he/she will have to meet strict criteria on indoor rowing and on the water. Federation officials do not expect anyone to be able to meet the set criteria next year. 

[Makedonas 2,239]

On 9/1/2021 at 5:27 PM, Makedonas said:

Anneta Kyridou suspended from the Greek national team for one year.

 

No, she didn't fail or miss a doping test. All athletes were required to show negative PCR tests to enter one of the training camps earlier this year. The medical centre where she got tested accidentally gave her a rapid test. Now she is being accused of "putting other athletes at risk" despite it not being her mistake and she apologized and immediately went to get a PCR test after it was revealed that the place where she got tested made a mistake.

 

Really a ridiculous decision and the real reason is that she is not liked by the federation because she exposed some coaches for abusing athletes.

Also it should be known that the other athletes entered the training camp without their PCR results yet anyways so that was fine (they received them the next day) but Anneta who entered with a negative test result from the rapid test was "putting other athletes at risk."

 

Even more disappointing is that our gold medalist Stefanos Ntouskos is the athletes' representative in the federation and he is one of the people who voted to suspend Anneta for one year (the maximum penalty). 

 

It's all about politics.

 

Also the Kyridou sisters seem to be on one side and Bourmpou/Ntouskos on the other, they don't follow each other on Instagram anymore (even Maria Kyridou and Christina Bourmpou who were in the women's pair together and won so many gold medals together unfollowed each other).

[Olympian1010 8,235]

World Rowing has accepted LA28’s proposal for rowing to be held at Long Beach Marine Stadium, likely reducing the race distance to 1500m.

 

Here’s an article about the decision: https://www.row2k.com/news/11-11-2021/World-Rowing-Approves-Long-Beach-Marine-Stadium-for-LA2028--Course-Will-Be-1500-Meters--Tidal/129943/

[Makedonas 2,239]

I'm sorry but that is a total joke. Very disappointing!

 

Will the 2027 World Championships and other qualification regattas also be just 1500m?!

[phelps 8,302]

what a farce!

 

the most stupid decision they could take!  

 

welcome to a new sport! 

 

400 years thrown in the trash can!