ROWING: This weekend at Essen regatta in Germany Ireland's elite lightweight squad get their first chance to feel the heat of international competition this season.
The preparation has been excellent and most of the athletes are fit and ready. Much of the interest will be in how the crews which have been put together fare, even if everyone knows that it is early days in a programme targeted towards the World Championships in Milan in August and ultimately the Olympics in Athens next year.
Current world lightweight single sculls champion Sam Lynch forms a crew with the outstanding Gearoid Towey in the open (heavyweight) double sculls category on Sunday, as does the lightweight single champion of 1991, Niall O'Toole with Tim Harnedy.
O'Toole has just turned 33 but is confident he is back in top form, and Harnedy is an outstanding prospect, and if the two crews race each other it will make for an interesting clash.
The relevant Olympic classes for Ireland are the men's lightweight double and lightweight four and the women's lightweight double. With some doubt as to whether Lynch, who is naturally on the higher end of the lightweight weight class, will eventually end up in the double, there will be much interest in the lightweight double class tomorrow where Harnedy and current Irish lightweight champion Eugene Coakley are entered. O'Toole and Harnedy have also been entered in the lightweight double on Sunday.
Two different lightweight fours are given outings: tomorrow Towey, O'Toole, Neil Casey and Paul Griffin team up, while on Sunday Griffin and Casey team up with Richard Archibald and Coakley.
With Sinead Jennings not competing this weekend, Fiola Foley and Heather Boyle team up in the lightweight double both tomorrow and Sunday.
Siobhan Jacob is entered in the lightweight single, making it a family affair for her, as her husband, Sean Jacob, represents the country in the men's heavyweight single. The Jacobs' clubmates in Commercial have a strong entry in the singles races at the regatta, but have prioritised their men's quadruple scull. Sean Casey will still compete in the single, however, and Becky Quinn in the lightweight single.
In the men's coxless pair, NUIG's Paul Giblin and Alan Martin are also entered on both days, and Dave Wallace is entered in the lightweight single.
