World Rowing Cup I day two: Great Britain set up 12 medal opportunities for final day

Eleven British boats join the men’s four in medal finals from Saturday’s action-packed day at World Rowing Cup I in Belgrade


Karen Bennett and Holly Norton at World Rowing Cup 1 (Naomi Baker)

Matt Rossiter and Jacob Dawson continued their fine form in the men’s pair, winning their semi-final by a length from Belarus. Leading from the start, Rossiter and Dawson could see Dzimitry Furman and Siarhei Valadzko battling hard to move level, but the Brits held the eight-metre gap to the line to progress to Sunday’s A final. There they will face the popular local crew of Nenad Bedik and Milos Vasic, who raced to victory in almost the same time as the Brits in their semi-final.

Peter Chambers and Will Fletcher also won their semi-final in the lightweight men’s double sculls, two seconds ahead of Poland and the Czech Republic. They will face Irish Olympic silver medal winning brothers Gary and Paul O’Donovan in the final, who won their semi final. Zak Lee-Green and Sam Mottram in GBR2 finished fourth and progress to the B final.

Victoria Thornley will race in the women’s A final of the single sculls, winning her heat by nearly three seconds from Ireland’s Sanita Puspure, having led from start to finish.

And both British boats in the men’s quadruple sculls secured their place in the medal final, with the senior boat, containing John Collins, Jonny Walton, Tom Barras and Jack Beaumont, finishing a length ahead of the Netherlands. The British U23 boat, featuring Harry Leask, Rowan Law, Harry Glenister and Andy Joel, battled well to finish third.

Great Britain’s men’s eight started the 2020 Olympiad where they finished the 2016 one – winning their first race of the year to get the pick of the lanes in the final. The boat, which contains Olympic champion Tom Ransley, took the race lead soon after the 500m mark and never looked back.

Holly Norton and Karen Bennett secured a favourable lane in the women’s pair final, winning their race for lanes against two Dutch boats. The pair were in control all the way, crossing the line two seconds ahead of NED2.

Sam Scrimgeour and Joel Cassells also won their preliminary race in the lightweight men’s pair. The British boat tussled with the Irish duo up to the halfway mark before moving up in the second thousand metres to take the win by over two seconds.

British boats finished second and third in the lightweight women’s race for lanes, with Maddie Arlett and Emily Craig finishing ahead of Katherine Copeland and Charlotte Booth.

The women’s quadruple sculls, containing World U23 champions Mathilda Hodgkins-Byrne and Jessica Leyden, finished third in their race for lanes behind Poland and the Netherlands.

And Peter Lambert will race in the B final of the men’s single sculls. The Olympian won his repechage in the morning session but a fourth place finish in a semi-final won by Olympic silver medallist Damir Martin sees Lambert racing for places on Sunday.

>>>World Rowing Cup I day one report


Morning session
Men’s single repechage 2
1. Lambert, Peter (GBR), 6:55.10
2. Petervari-Molnar, Bendeguz (HUN), 6:56.51
3. Yotov, Boris, (BUL), 6:56.81

Lightweight men’s double repechage 1
1. Van Gennep, Jort & Lukkes, Bart (NED), 6:24.62
2. Lee-Green, Zak & Mottram, Samuel (GBR), 6:25.33
3. Csiszar, Peter & Tamas, Bence (HUN) 6:27.04

Women’s pair preliminary
1. Bennett, Karen & Norton, Holly (GBR), 7:08.57
2. Jorritsma, Aletta & Florijn, Karolien (NED2), 7:10.47
3. Rustenburg, Lies & Van Veen, Jose (NED1), 7:11.31

Lightweight men’s pair preliminary
1. Cassells, Joel & Scrimgeour, Sam (GBR), 6:39.30
2. O’Donovan, Mark & O’Driscoll, Shame (IRL), 6:41.61
3. Bolozin, Nikita & Kiiashko, Aleksei (RUS), 6:43.42

Lightweight women’s double preliminary
1. Deresz, Weronika & Mikolajczak, Martyna (POL), 6:56.06
2. Arlett, Maddie & Craig, Emily (GBR2), 6:57.40
3. Copeland, Katherine & Booth, Charlotte (GBR1), 7:00.34

Men’s eight preliminary
1. Great Britain, 5:32.46
2. Poland, 5:33.42
3. Russia, 5:33.92

Afternoon session
Women’s quad preliminary
1. Poland, 6:21.85
2. Netherlands, 6:25.77
3. Great Britain (Hodgkins-Byrne, Mathilda; Bryan, Beth; Nixon, Holly; Leyden, Jess), 6:31.20

Men’s pair semi-final 1
1. Dawson, Jacob & Rossiter, Matt (GBR), 6:38.35
2. Furman, Dzimitry & Valadzko, Siarhei (BLR), 6:40.10
3. Podrazil, Jakub & Helesic, Lukas (CZE), 6:42.14

Women’s single repechage 1
1. Thornley, Vicky (GBR), 7:39.32
2. Puspure, Sanita (IRL), 7:42.17
3. Furman, Alena (BLR), 7:46.28

Men’s single semi-final 1
1. Martin, Damir (CRO), 6:58.53
2. Ryabcev, Vladislav, (RUS), 6:59.38
3. Marjanovic, Marko (SRB), 7:00.61
5. Lambert, Peter (GBR), 7:13.86

Lightweight men’s double semi-final
1. Chambers, Peter & Fletcher, Will (GBR1), 6:23.98
2. Kowalski, Jerzy & Jankowski, Milosz (POL), 6:25.85
3. Simanek, Jiri & Vrastil, Miroslav (CZE) 6:26.34
4. Lee-Green, Zak & Mottram, Sam (GBR2), 6:30.67

Men’s quad repechage
1. Great Britain 1 (Barras, Tom, Beaumont, Jack, Walton, Jonny; Collins, John), 5:52.31
2. Netherlands, 5:54.71
3. Great Britain 2 (Leask, Harry; Law, Rowan; Glenister, Harry; Joel, Andy), 5:57.35