ROWING/Henley Regatta: Sport is unpredictable. Ireland's one crew to battle through to the semi-final stage of Henley Royal Regatta today is a Belfast Rowing Club eight in the Thames Cup whose line-up was finalised only in the run-up to the regatta.
Ireland are guaranteed a place in tomorrow's finals by virtue of a composite quadruple scull which goes in a straight final of the Queen Mother. If this crew, stroked by 19-year-old Offalyman Rory O'Connor, upsets the powerful France quadruple, it will be an enormous surprise, and only this would knock Belfast out of their place as the story of the regatta so far for Ireland.
Belfast set the standard in the flat, calm conditions of the early morning yesterday when they took out one of the seeds, London Rowing Club B, by one-third of a length in six minutes 33 seconds - the fastest time by any crew at the regatta so far. But as the day wore on all six other Irish crews fell, with Belfast's Wyfold four last to go, beaten easily by Thames.
"We had a good old race in the eight," said Belfast coach Garth Young. "But in the four the lads were feeling the effects of (also rowing in) the eight. We weren't expecting to get this far with both crews." Once Thames got out in the lead early it was race over.
Today, Belfast face London's A crew. "They're certainly not unbeatable," says Young. "We're very much looking forward to it."
The story was very different for one of Ireland's best hopes, the UCD women's eight in the Remenham Cup. They were caught napping by a Furnivall crew which came from behind to take out their seeded opponents. UCD coach John Holland was characteristically blunt. "They left it behind them," he said.
Trinity bowed out valiantly in the Temple Cup with a narrow defeat to Cornell University. The Dublin crew led at the Barrier, a quarter-mile in, and though they fell back to a length behind they kept going and pressed the winners hard at the end.
Shannon, up against the much bigger Army Rowing Club crew in the Visitors' Cup, fought hard but lost out by three-quarters of a length.
