Rigney and Holt Row to A Finals

Australia will race for medals in 13 events after NSW Institute of Sport (NSWIS) athlete Tara Rigney in the Women’s Single Scull and the Men’s Pair of Rohan Lavery and Patrick Holt, also NSWIS, secured spots in the A-Finals at World Rowing Cup III in Poland.  

Rigney cemented herself as a leading chance for Gold after she posted the fastest time by 10 seconds in the A/B Semi-Finals on Saturday morning.  

She qualified ahead of Magdalena Lobnig of Austria and Germany’s Juliane Faralisch from A/B Semi-Final 1, while Swiss sculler Aurelia-Maxima Janzen, the USA’s Margaret Fellows and Pole Wiktoria Kalinowska make up the rest of the A-Finalists.  

Lavery and Holt held off a fast-finishing Great Britain 1 crew to cross the line second and progress to the A-Final. The Aussies will be joined by two crews from New Zealand, the 2023 World Champion Swiss Pair, Olympic Champion Sinkovic brothers from Croatia and Great Britain 2. 

In other races for Australia, the AUS 2 Women’s Pair of Eliza Gaffney and Samantha Morton fell just short of a spot in the A-Final after getting pipped at the line by the France 2 crew.  

The duo held their heads high and rowed with technical precision and ruthlessness to finish 22 seconds ahead of the Romanians in the B-Final. They will now look to race in the Women’s Eight in the AUS 2 crew. 

The Men’s Double Scull of NSWIS athletes David Bartholot and Marcus Della Marta will race in tomorrow’s B-Final after finishing fifth in the A/B Semi-Final. The crew needed to finish third in order to progress into the A-Final.  

Both Jackson Kench and Kathryn Rowan completed their World Rowing Cup III campaigns, each racing in the C-Final in the Single Scull. Rowan finished 14th and Kench 16th.  

Article and image courtesy of Rowing Australia