Monday Race Preview

August 28, 2011

BLED, Slovenia – With the first day of racing at the 2011 World Rowing Championships in the books, the second wave of heats will get started Monday morning, followed by repechages.

With a schedule compacted to accommodate four days of finals, racing will begin at 9:30 a.m. local time.

The morning begins with the first round of adaptive rowing and Tricia Downing (Denver, Colo.) racing the arms and shoulders women’s single sculls. Rowing in her first-ever international singles race, the 2009 duathlon world champion will race Russia, France, Brazil, Korea and Belarus. Brazil’s Claudia Santos was the 2007 world champion and won silver last year in New Zealand. Three of the four boats in the heat advance to the quarterfinal.

Following Downing will be Ron Harvey (Downingtown, Pa.) rowing in the arms and shoulders men’s single sculls. Harvey, an eight-time national team athlete and 2008 Paralympian, will face entries from Australia, China, Russia, Korea and Israel. Two boats will advance from the heat to a semifinal.

Next up will be the trunk and arms mixed double sculls team of Anthony Davis (La Center, Wash.) and Jacqui Kapinowski (Point Pleasant, N.J.). The duo will face Greece, Australia, Poland and Great Britain. The toughest competition in the heat should be the Australian team of Kathryn Ross and John MacLean, who rowed together in the 2008 Paralympic Games. The top three finishers will advance to the semifinal.

In the final adaptive heat of the day, the legs, trunk and arms mixed four with coxswain team of Alex Stein (Stamford, Conn.), Eleni Englert (Oceanside, Calif.), Emma Preuschl (Indianapolis, Ind.), Andrew Johnson (Greenwich, Conn.) and Eric McDaniel (Weeki Wachee, Fla.) will row against Italy, Germany, Russia and France. All four rowers return from the boat that finished sixth last year in New Zealand. The top two crews from the heat will advance to the semifinal.

Following the adaptive program will be the men’s pair with coxswain team of Anthony Altimari (Huntington, N.Y.), Blaise Didier (San Francisco, Calif.) and
Derek Johnson (Hillsborough, Calif.). The U.S. crew will race Canada, Ukraine and Italy, with the first-place boat advancing to the final. Italy placed second at the world championships in 2010.

In women’s eight, the U.S. crew of coxswain Mary Whipple (Sacramento, Calif.),
Eleanor Logan (Boothbay Harbor, Maine), Caroline Lind (Greensboro, N.C.), Amanda Polk (Pittsburgh, Pa.), Jamie Redman (Spokane, Wash.), Taylor Ritzel (Larkspur, Colo.), Meghan Musnicki (Naples, N.Y.), Susan Francia (Abington, Pa.) and Esther Lofgren (Newport Beach, Calif.) will face crews from Ukraine, Great Britain and Germany.

The U.S. has won the last five world championships, including the 2008 Olympic Games. They will face stiff competition from Great Britain, which finished fourth at the 2010 World Rowing Championships and at the Lucerne world cup last month. First place in the heat advances to the final.

Next up will be lightweight women’s quadruple sculls. The team of Katherine Robinson (Everett, Wash.), Lindsey Hochman (Seattle, Wash.), Nicole Dinion (Falls Church, Va.) and Hillary Saeger (Dedham, Mass.) will race against crews from France, Italy, Australia, Germany and Argentina. The U.S. is the defending silver medalist in the event while Germany is the defending 2010 champion. The first place boat advances to the final.

After taking the world cup overall points trophy in the lightweight women’s double sculls, Julie Nichols (Livermore, Calif.) and Kristin Hedstrom (Concord, Mass.) will go to the line in the final heat of the morning against Korea, Belarus, Italy, Denmark and Mexico. The duo is the top seed in the heat. Italy finished sixth in Lucerne and should be in the running for the podium. Only one boat advances to the final from the heat.

Repechages, or second-chance racing begins at noon local time, with the lightweight men’s pair team of Kyle Lafferty (Hockessin, Del.) and Phillip Oertle (Zurich, Switzerland) rowing against Bulgaria, France, Spain and Hong Kong. Lafferty and Oertle finished fifth in their heat Sunday with a time of 6:53.45. The best time of the group tomorrow was a 6:40.91 logged by Bulgaria.

Complete heat sheets, entries and results are available at www.worldrowing.com.

For complete coverage of U.S. crews, press releases, features and photos, visit www.usrowing.org.

USRowing is a nonprofit organization recognized by the United States Olympic Committee as the governing body for the sport of rowing in the United States. USRowing’s official suppliers include Boathouse Sports, Vespoli, Win Tech, Filippi, Croker Oars, Rudy Project, Concept2, Nielsen Kellerman, PowerHTV and Ludus Tours. USRowing also receives generous support from the National Rowing Foundation and its corporate sponsors, ANXeBusiness Corp and Voxer. For more information, visit www.usrowing.org. USRowing has joined forces with Team Arnstein to help ensure the U.S. Team's success leading up to the 2012 Olympic Games under a new corporate sponsorship campaign, The Row to London. For more information, please visit www.teamarnstein.com.

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Ed Moran

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