Image credit: World Rowing
The first World Cup of any new season is often a bit of a tepid affair, with lots of straight finals or no races in some boat classes at all. But, this year, in Varese, it’s a different matter. Being Olympic year, and with the Final Olympic Qualifying Regatta just five weeks away, Varese has drawn a huge and high quality field.
So, as always, I’ll look at each boat class and pick out the main contenders.
Entries: 10
This has the makings of a really competitive event with five of the top six crews from 2023 racing (only Poland are absent from the 2023 A-Final).
The Netherlands were the standout men’s crew in 2023 and return with an unchanged line-up for 2024, Lennart Van Lierop, Finn Florijn, Tone Wieten and Koen Metesmakers. They were a joy to watch in 2023 with some truly beautiful quad sculling. Weiten and Metesmakers were part of the M4X that won gold in Tokyo. Van Lierop started the 2023 season in the M1X, handing Ollie Zeidler a rare defeat in winning gold at the European Championships. They will be looking to get their Olympic season off to a flying start.
Runners-up to the Dutch last year were Italy. They, like the Dutch, come into 2024 with an unchanged line-up from their silver medal crew, Nicolo’ Carucci, Andrea Panizza, Luca Chiumento and Giacomo Gentili. This quartet also raced together in 2022, winning the European Championships and taking bronze at the Worlds.
Italy has a second boat racing which is their U23 crew of Andrea Pazzagli, Marco Selva, Leonardo Tedoldi and Edoardo Rocchi. This line-up finished second to the #1 Italian boat at the Piediluco Regatta last month
Great Britain makes one change to the crew that finished fourth in 2023. Graeme Thomas comes in to replace George Bourne. Thomas won bronze in the M1X in 2022 but injury meant he missed the whole of the 2023 season. He’s one of the most experienced members of the British team, having made his debut back in 2011. He partnered John Collins to fourth in the M2X at the Tokyo Olympics. Thomas joins Tom Barras (who also has a M1X World Championship bronze medal and was in the quad which won GB’s first ever M4X Olympic medal in Tokyo), Callum Dixon and Matt Haywood. Both Barras and Haywood were in the M4X that won World Championship silver in 2022.
Fifth at the 2023 World Champions was Switzerland and they also start 2024 with an unchanged line-up in Dominic Condrau, Jan Plocek, Scott Baerlocher and Maurin Lange. This crew came together late in the season last year and the World Championships was their first race in their final line-up and their fifth place was the best by a Swiss M4X since 2015.
Australia has a very talented and experienced crew racing, with Tokyo Olympic bronze medallists Jack Cleary and Caleb Antill. They are joined by Campbell Watts (who was fourth in this boat class in 2019) and U23 bronze medallist Alexander Rossi. Australia had a disappointing 2023 season with the quad (which included Cleary and Antill) only managing 11th and therefore missing Olympic qualification. Rowing Australia has publicly stated that they won’t be sending the M4X to the Final Olympic Qualifying Regatta, so this boat is part of their “Project LA” development squad.
Germany has struggled in this event since winning the Olympic title in Rio. Since then they haven’t made the podium at Olympic, World or European level. In 2023 they finished sixth, good enough to secure Olympic qualification and they enter Olympic year with the same quartet, Anton Finger, Max Appel, Tim Ole Naske and Moritz Wolf. Appel and Ole Naske were in the boat that finished eighth in Tokyo.
The final three crews entered are Norway, Spain and Ukraine. Norway has two of the crew that finished tenth last year in Martin Helseth (who also sculled in the quad in Tokyo) and Erling Oeyasaeter. Joining them are Mathias Foyner Wie (12th in the M2X in 2022) and Ole Amund Storlien (11th in the M4- at the 2022 European Championships).
Spain has lightweights Manel Balstegui (eighth in the LM1X last season) and U23 BLM2X bronze medallist Antonio Diaz Ramos along with Gonzalo Garcia Ferrero (21st in the M1X last year) and Jordi Jofre Senciales (19th in the M1X in 2022).
Ukraine has a strong tradition in this boat class, particularly at European level. This year they have two of the crew that finished 12th last year, Ivan Dovgodko and Olexandr Nadtoka. They are joined by two rowers from the 2023 M4-, Maksym Boklazhenko and Mykola Mazur.
Prediction
The Netherlands will be favourites to continue their gold medal run, but behind them it’ll be a good battle between the Italians and the British. GB will hope that their change in line-up, bringing in the highly experienced Thomas, will help them get their bows ahead of the Italians and within striking distance of the Dutch. I’m going for the Netherlands in gold with Italy in silver just ahead of the British in bronze.
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