655 Athletes announced at stage two of 2010 Rowing World Cup
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Rowers from 40 nations are taking part in stage two of the 2010 Rowing World Cup series which is to takes place in Munich, Germany, from 18 to 20 June on the 1972 Olympic Regatta Course. A total of 655 athletes in 293 boats are entered.
Currently leading the Rowing World Cup points standings (75 points), Great Britain has 21 crews entered and participate in all but two of the 17 events being raced. With 72 athletes entered, host nation Germany, who achieved only 14 points at the first Rowing World Cup this year, will be in full force to claim the valuable points to bring them back up to par with their usual rivals for the Cup.
World Rowing's four flagship events, the women and men's single sculls and women and men's eight, also described as the "Blue Riband" events, shall be raced consecutively at the end of the racing programme. This provides a concise, all inclusive one-hour programme of the best known boat classes that can be easily broadcast and promoted.
In the women's single sculls, Ekaterina Karsten-Khodotovitch of Belarus, who has dominated the event for the past decade, shall again be the favourite at this regatta. Contenders Mirka Knapkova (CZE) and New Zealand's Emma Twigg (silver at Rowing World Cup I), who have often managed to lead Karsten in some stages of the race, but never to the line, shall be present to take on the challenge once again in Munich.
With 32 boats entered in the men's single sculls, the biggest entry for this regatta, competition will be fierce.
Olympic silver medallist Ondrej Synek of the Czech Republic rowed a very controlled and confident race at the first Rowing World Cup last month to win and his racing maturity looks to have really come to the fore this year. This means that Great Britain's Alan Campbell will have to dig deep in the middle section of the race if he wants to be in the lead at the finish. Marcel Hacker of Germany will need to up his game in the first 500m of the race and Olympic Champion Olaf Tufte of Norway, who raced in the double at Bled, will have to display his off-season training improvements.
It is still unsure if current World Champion, Mahe Drysdale (NZL) will race in Munich, having already pulled out of World Cup I due to an ongoing injury.
Great Britain will be striving to keep up their lead in the women and men's eight. Both crews took gold in Bled, and will be fighting off the opposition to stay on top. The British women will face the Romanians. This is Romania's flagship crew and they always race to win. Germany and China (who finished with bronze in Bled with a slightly different line-up) also place great importance on their women's eight, all in all giving Great Britain a good set of powerful crews to keep at bay.
In the men's eight, the field has swelled for the second stage of the 2010 Rowing World Cup with a total of 10 nations competing. Germany is lining up with a nearly identical crew to the one that won gold at last year's World Rowing Championships. The only change is the swapping in of Maximilian Reinelt and Lukas Mueller.
Poland, who were not happy with their third place finish in Bled, are back to put things right in Munich, and China will be aiming to lift their game into a medal spot.
A full Rowing World Cup event by event preview will be available on www.worldrowing.com from Wednesday 16 June.
Entries and race schedules are available at the following links from today:
http://www.worldrowing.com/index.php?pageid=151
The event finals will be video streamed live on Sunday 20 June and can be accessed through the www.worldrowing.com website.
The Rowing World Cup series was launched in 1997, and includes all 14 Olympic boat classes. The overall Rowing World Cup winners are determined after a series of three regattas. Germany has dominated the series since its beginning ten years ago, with Great Britain upsetting the usual trend by finishing 68 points ahead of Germany in 2009. This year, the three stages of the series are held in Bled, Slovenia (27-30 May), Munich, Germany (18-20 June); and the final in Lucerne, Switzerland (9-11 July).
Media accreditation can be requested through the website (www.worldrowing.com > media > media accreditation).
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