Thoughts turn to picking Irish squad

ROWING:AFTER A successful development camp at the National Rowing Centre in Cork, the focus now switches to Newry next month and the business of choosing an Ireland squad for the season.

And youth will be to the fore at the two-day assessment: 64 junior men are on the provisional list of invitees, while there are just five open (heavyweight) men; for women, it is 42 juniors and just three senior heavyweights.

In between lies the current strength of Irish rowing, at under-23 level, especially in the lightweight category.

While the conversion rate of juniors to successful seniors is as low in rowing as in many sports, the activities of the new system have brought up the level of juniors, according to lead junior coach Derek Holland.

He cites the statistics from last month’s National Indoor Championships, where two junior men, Adrian Sheehan and Fionnan Tolan, broke six minutes 30 seconds for the 2,000 metres. Six junior men set the same standard at the British equivalent.

Holland – a former Ireland international – cites the more cohesive nature of the programme compared to its predecessors, with training programmes available to ambitious juniors in every club.

They also get to train alongside the leading internationals.

One top athlete who has had an excellent junior career is Laura D’Urso, who has accepted a place at Clemson University in South Carolina. The Donegalwoman teamed up with Lisa Dilleen to win two gold medals for Ireland at the Coupe de la Jeunesse in 2008 and to finish fourth at the World Junior Championships in 2009.

Action on the water this weekend comes in the form of tomorrow’s Killorglin Head of the River, which has drawn an entry predominantly from Kerry and west Cork.

The open discussion forum hosted by Rowing Ireland is set for Neptune Rowing Club in Dublin on Sunday.

Much further afield, a six-man crew which has a strong Irish component are attempting to break the record for rowing the Atlantic Ocean. The Sara G left Tarfaya in Morocco last week bound for Barbados. The skipper is Matt Craughwell from England, and there are two Irishmen on board: Adam Langton Burke from Skerries and the experienced ocean rower Rob Byrne from Bray.

The record for the trip is 33 days seven hours and 30 minutes, set two years ago by the crew of La Mondiale, which featured Irishmen Peter Donaldson, Ray Carroll and Reinhardt von Hof.

That record was set for the journey from Gran Canaria to Barbados.

The Sara G will be travelling farther and will be considered to have broken the record if they beat the time of 37 days 22 hours and 10 minutes.

In April, Keith Whelan intends to become the first Irishman to row the Indian Ocean, going from Australia to Mauritius.