Rowing: Only eight months after he rowed in an Olympic final, Paul Griffin competes at the National Rowing Centre in Cork today knowing he may not make the international team this year.
"My season could end tomorrow afternoon," the Killarney man said yesterday as he prepared for this weekend's final trial.
Griffin (25), stroked the lightweight four which finished sixth in Athens, but a stress fracture of the ribs has severely limited his participation in the comprehensive testing programme set in place by head coach Harald Jahrling.
He has been cut the slack of being allowed to compete in the final trial, which continues until Sunday, but if he fails to make the grade he will not be part of the team for the World Cups and World Championships this year.
Griffin's task is all the more demanding because today's first session for lightweights will be in single sculls. He has always been a sweep oarsman and describes his experience in the single scull as "very poor".
"I've never raced in a single. My first 2,000 metres will be at 9 o'clock tomorrow morning. It's a steep learning curve," he said.
Jahrling said yesterday that at this stage his only way of creating what he calls "a level playing field" for the priority boat, the lightweight four, is to see all those who want to be part of it compete in singles.
Griffin, in typically combative form, says that if the does not make the elite squad he will compete domestically this season - in the single.
"This is what it is going to be like in the future," Jahrling said. "If you want to have an Olympic medal-winning boat you need your best individuals."
The no-nonsense German dismisses any suggestion that the expense of the trip to this year's World Championships, which are in Gifu in Japan, has led to the prioritising of a small number of boats. "No, the quality of the athletes will be the determining factor," he says.
Jahrling, an Olympic gold medallist in 1976 and 1980, also makes no apologies for targeting Olympic classes in the World Cups and World Championships.
"We tried the avenue of sending non-Olympic boats in 2001 and 2002, but in Athens in 2004 we did not get what we hoped for," he says. "Why would we repeat mistakes?"
The appeal of Olympian Gearóid Towey on his lack of Sports Council funding will be heard today.
Towey and Ciarán Lewis will row the Atlantic later this year - and will, apparently, be joined by another Irish crew in the shape of Paul Gleeson and Irish-Canadian Tori Holmes.
