Rowing: The Irish men's heavyweight four of Cormac Folan, Sean O'Neill, Sean Casey, and Alan Martin won today's B final over Canada and World Cup silver medalists New Zealand at the Rowing World Championships in Eton to secure seventh place overall.
Considering it's only the quartet's first season on the international stage the result marks a positive improvement since they competed in the World's last year and finished 10th.
"We knew they (New Zealand) were beatable based on our races throughout the season," remarked a beamed Martin after the race. "We knew if we rowed as best as we could we had a chance, and we did that. The water was rough and with conditions like that it's very easy to make a mistake. We handled the weather well and we're just really pleased with our race."
The Irish boat was particularly impressive during the middle stage of the race and were fastest of the six boats over the middle 100metres. Canada had set the pace and were leading at the midpoint from the Irish four with the Kiwi crew occupying third.
At the 1250m mark the Irish boat drew level with the Canadians and with 500m to go Irieland seized the lead. Despite strong challenges from the Canadian and New Zealand crews the Irish four held on to cross the line first.
Crucially, the result keeps the target of Olympic qualification at next year's world championships very much on track - the top eleven boats at next year's event qualify for Beijing 2008.
"We knew it was within us so it's just very satisfying to do it," added Martin who is Ireland's stroke in the boat. "It sets us up nicely for the next two years to Beijing. It'll give us good confidence through the winter."
The Irish men's lightweight four of Gearoid Towey (Fermoy), Eugene Coakley (Skibbereen), Richard Archibald (Lady Victoria BC), and Paul Griffin (Muckross) take on the elite of international rowing in tomorrow afternoon's world championship final at 2.15pm.
The women's lightweight double of Sinéad Jennings and Niamh NiCheilleachair contest the B final of their event at 10.17am tomorrow morning.
Irish Men's Heavyweight Four
Cormac Folan (NUIG)
Sean O'Neill (Central RPC, New Zealand)
Sean Casey (Muckross)
Alan Martin (NUIG)