#WorldUnder-23Rowing: Ireland qualified two more boats for the A Finals of the World Under-23 Rowing Championships at Linz in Austria this morning, nailing top-three places in the semi-finals to join the women’s four in the hunt for medals.
Denise Walsh started the day well for the team in green by qualifying in the lightweight single sculls. Aikaterini Nikolaidou of Greece led the semi-final all the way down the course and won. Walsh and Anna Berger of Austria got away from Julie Marechal of France to secure second and third, with the Austrian pipping the Skibbereen woman for second.
The favourite for gold, Andrew Campbell Jr of the United States, set the pace in the second semi-final of the lightweight single sculls. Paul O’Donovan again had a slow start and by half way still trailed the American by more than a length. O’Donovan, characteristically, closed on his rival in the second half, but Campbell held him off. Zak Lee-Green of Britain took the third qualifying place.
In the men’s pair, Fionnán McQuillan-Tolan and Seán O’Connor finished fifth in a race in which South Africa, Greece and Serbia took a grip of the qualifying places quite early.
Ireland’s lightweight double scull of Shane O’Driscoll and Gary O’Donovan fought their way from sixth to fourth in the middle stages of their semi-final, but could not break into the top three. Poland pushed them into fifth in the second half of the race.
World Under-23 Rowing Championships, Linz, Austria, Day Four (Irish interest, selected results)
Men
Pair - (First Three to A Final; rest to B Final) – Semi-Final One: 1 South Africa (D Hunt, V Breet) 6:46.15, 2 Greece (K Christomanos, A Dafnis) 6:49.16, 3 Serbia (M Vasic, R Deric) 6:49.47; 4 Hungary 6:50.31, 5 Ireland (S O’Connor, F McQuillan-Tolan) 6:59.77, 6 Lithuania 7:20.32.
Lightweight Double Sculls – (First Three to A Final; rest to B Final) – Semi-Final One: 1 Germany (M Moos, J Osborne) 6:36.55, 2 Italy (L Barbaro, S Molteni) 6:37.75, 3 Spain (J de Haz, J Zabala Artetxe) 6:37.88; 4 Poland 6:38.49, 5 Ireland (S O’Driscoll, G O’Donovan) 6:46.30, 6 Norway 6:48.13.
Lightweight Single Sculls – (First Three to A Final; rest to B Final) – Semi-Final One: 1 United States (A Campbell) 7:11.15, 2 Ireland (P O’Donovan) 7:12.58, 3 Britain (Z Lee-Green) 7:14.26; 4 Australia 7:22.67, 5 Italy 7:24.34, 6 Germany 7:28.69.
Women
Lightweight Single Sculls – (First Three to A Final; rest to B Final) – Semi-Finals Two: 1 Greece (A Nikolaidou) 7:54.92, 2 Austria (A Berger) 8:00.22, 3 Ireland (D Walsh) 8:00.28; 4 France 8:04.30, 5 Germany 8:11.25, 6 Cyprus 8:11.63.
