Four Sydney University rowing members competed for Australia on the opening day of the 2009 World Championships in Poznan, Poland.
First up was Sarah Cook in the Women’s Pair with Kim Crow. Rowing in Heat 2 of 3, Kim and Sarah came in third in approximately the fifth fastest time of the day. This puts them through the semi-finals on Thursday afternoon.
Next on the course was the Women’s Double with Sydney University’s Sally Kehoe teaming with Pip Savage from Queensland. The crew is coached by SUBC’s Director of Rowing, Phil Bourguignon.
The double won Heat 2 of 3 in 7:04.71 – the fastest of the three heats just shading Poland’s time in winning Heat 3 by about half a second. This was an excellent start and puts the crew in the semi-finals Thursday.
The last crew with SUBC members on board was the Men’s Four – silver medallists in Beijing. The four see this event as their first step towards the London Olympic Games in 2012 where they hope to go one better than Beijing.
The crew (unchanged from 2008) is Francis Hegerty and Matt Ryan from Sydney University and James Marburg and Cam McKenzie McHarg from Melbourne University. They are coached by SUBC’s 1976 Olympian and QAS head coach Tim Conrad.
The four had a solid performance winning heat 3 of 3 in the day’s quickest time of 5:57.85 about 0.7sec ahead of Germany. Other contenders in this event look to be New Zealand, Great Britain and Slovenia, who all did around 6.00.05 and Poland, Czech Republic and USA all around 6:02.
The pressure will be on in the semi-finals as eight crews with “A final” times battle it out for six spots in the final next Saturday.
SUBC rowers competing for Australia on day 2 will be:
Men’s Eight: Toby Lister (cox), Richard Allsop, Fergus Pragnell, Sam Loch and Mitch Estens.
Women’s Lightweight Double: Bronwen Watson.
Men’s Quad Sculls: Nick Hudson.
