The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Trials decided the remaining eight of the 14 crews that either are qualified already or hoping to qualify for this summer’s Olympic Games, as well as two Para boats for the Paralympic Games.
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Single sculler Kara Kohler and the men’s and women’s pairs of Oliver Bubb and Billy Bender and Jess Thoenness and Azja Czajkowski will race in Paris by virtue of winning Olympic trials in the previously qualified boat classes.
The winning men’s and women’s quads, men’s single, men’s lightweight and open doubles, and the Para PR1 men’s single and PR2 mixed double all now go to Lucerne, Switzerland, for the World Rowing Final Olympic & Paralympic Qualification Regatta, May 19 to 21, where they will have to finish in the top two to earn places for Paris.
“It’s a relief,” said Kohler, after winning the singles trial against Community Rowing, Inc.’s Maggie Fellows, who had won the winter speed order in February on the same Nathan Benderson Park course in Sarasota, Fla.
Kohler, fourth at last year’s world championships, will become a three-time Olympian, having won a bronze medal in the women’s quad in London and finished ninth in the single in Tokyo. Fellows goes home, having chosen to pursue the single to the end rather than accept an invitation to selection camp for the quad.
“That’s a hard case,” said USRowing head coach Josy Verdonkschot. “In the end, it’s a personal decision.” But the Olympic chief would have liked to have had the talents of Fellows in the mix for the women’s quad.
“It’s not like a computer game, where you can move everybody in the desired direction. Looking at it from her perspective, the part that I totally understand is she was going for a qualified spot.”
The winning pairs were athletes who were cut unexpectedly from the fours and eights, especially since less-accomplished rowers who placed below them in the February pairs speed order were selected instead. Although both pairs won the trials by open water, they weren’t cut from the big boats to make great Olympic pairs. Once that happened, though, they were guided in their choices of partners for the trials.
“We tried to help athletes who didn’t make big boats decide about combinations to make sure we gave our best athletes the best opportunity,” said Verdonkschot.
Craftsbury Green Racing Project’s Jacob Plihal won the men’s single trial by three seconds over Saugatuck’s Casey Fuller, with Penn AC’s Cedar Cunningham third. The U.S. has not qualified the men’s single for the Olympics since 2012 (Ken Jurkowski, 24th), and the event is typically one of the most competitive at the final qualifier.
The men’s double of Ben Davison and Sorin Koszyk, who missed Olympic qualification at last year’s Worlds after a sloppy race in the quarterfinals, won the right to race at the final qualifier with a 35-second trials win over the only other entry of World Beach Sprint Finals champions Christopher Bak and Kory Rogers of Next Level Rowing.
The lightweight men’s double of Columbia University grad Sam Melvin and Dartmouth’s Cooper Tuckerman won its trial convincingly for the chance to qualify in Lucerne. The women’s lightweight double is one of eight already-qualified Olympic events for the U.S., and the crew of Michelle Sechser and Molly Reckford was named through the Olympic selection camp held in Sarasota in March.
The U.S. men’s quad that finished ninth at last year’s Worlds—only the top seven fours and quads qualified for the Olympics—won the only close final of the trials, beating the other U.S. Training Center/Penn AC combo quad by half a second.
The women’s quad of Lauren O’Connor, Teal Cohen, Emily Delleman, and Grace Jones won its final by over seven seconds and, like the men’s quad, will travel to Lucerne in an attempt to finish in the top two of the final qualifying regatta. In slow conditions—a light headwind but little chop—both quads raced to 91 percent of Verdonkschot’s “Competitive Standard Time,” a promising sign for Olympic qualification, if not medals.
Two Para boats raced unopposed at trials, with Andrew Mangan winning the right to race for Paralympic qualification in the PR1 men’s single scull and Russell Gernaat and Madison Eberhard going in the PR2 mixed double.
There were no entries for the PR1 women’s single, and the U.S. has already qualified and named crews for the other two of five Paralympic events, the PR3 mixed double and PR3 mixed four with coxswain.
The U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Team Trials concluded the series of training camps, February speed order, Olympic selection camp, and trials preparations at Nathan Benderson Park. The U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee will officially name the Olympic and Paralympic teams June 7 and July 1, respectively.
