Queen Mother Challenge Cup
Holders: Leander Club
Entries: 4
The Chinese National Rowing Team will start as strong favourites. Their crew of Ha Zhang, Xudi Yi, Zhiyu Liu and Sulitan Adilijiang were winners at both the first and second World Cups this season. Zhang and Yi were members of the M4x that finished seventh in Tokyo and Liu won bronze in the M2X at the Olympics. 21-year-old Adilijiang made his debut at the Belgrade World Cup. Should China win it’ll be the first win at Henley for a men’s crew and only the second for the Chinese National Team.
Great Britain are represented by Leander Club. The Pink Palace have won this event for ten of the last 11 regattas (either as a sole club or as part of a composite). After a spectacular silver medal at the Tokyo Olympics the British quad has gone through something of a rebuild, with both Jack Beaumont and Angus Groom hanging up their sculls. At the first World Cup Seb Devereux and Sam Meijer came into the crew (both U23 World Champions and multiple Henley winners). They joined Tom Barras and Harry Leask who returned from the silver medal crew. Unfortunately, their first outing in Belgrade was a little disappointing and they failed to make the A-Final. For Henley the GB coaches have made one change to the crew with John Collins coming in to replace Sam Meijer. Collins is the most experienced member of the British team, having made his senior debut in 2012. He raced at the Rio Olympics finishing fifth in the M2X and again in Tokyo where he and partner Graeme Thomas, just missed out on a medal. This season he raced in the single at the first World Cup, winning his heat but then under-performing in his Quarter Final ending up in the C-Final which he won to finish 13th overall. It’s going to be interesting to see what change this has on the British crew, as the talent in the crew suggests they should be able to compete with the best in the world. They will definitely be looking for an improvement from Belgrade.
New Zealand, racing as Waiariki Rowing Club, are unchanged from the crew that raced in Poznan. Their crew includes Phillip Wilson, a member of the gold medal M8 (who’s last international sculling race was at the Junior world Championships). Also in the boat are Brook Robertson, who raced the M4- in Tokyo and Jordan Parry who finished 13th in the M1X. The only non-Olympian in the crew is Jack O’Leary, who made his senior debut in Poznan after racing in the U23 team in 2018. Poznan was a bit of an eye-opener for the Kiwi crew who, although they have a significant amount of sweep experience, hadn’t raced much in sculling. They ended up finishing 11th beaten by both the Czech and Polish second crews and by India (the first time an Indian crew has ever beaten a senior New Zealand boat at a senior World Rowing event 😉) Henley will no doubt be a learning experience for the Kiwis, and I expect the draw to pit them against either Leander or China.
The final crew in the event are the Americans, racing as Texas Rowing Centre and Vesper Boat Club. This quartet raced in two M2X at the Poznan World Cup with the USA1 boat of Jon Kirkegaard and Kevin Cardno finishing eighth and James Plihal and Dominique Williams finishing one place behind them. Kirkegaard and Cardno missed out on qualifying the M2X for Tokyo at the Final Olympic Qualifying Regatta and then went on to race at the second World Cup where they finished 14th. Both Pihal and Williams made their senior debuts in Poznan. As with the Kiwi boat, the US will be using Henley to get some good racing experience in the quad but will be unlikely to make the final.
Predictions: This should come down to a Leander v China final. The home crowd will be giving Leander all the help they can get and the British will be looking for a strong performance after the disappointment of Belgrade, but I can’t see them beating China who look absolutely superb.
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