Holders: Waiariki Rowing Club, New Zealand
Entries: 12
Waikato Rowing Club from New Zealand are in the draw to defend the title their counterparts for Waiakiri Rowing Club won last year. They have half of the crew that won the Premier W8 at the New Zealand Championships earlier this year – Justine Hobbs, Sophie Egnot-Johnson, Holly Mills and Isobel Eliadis-Watson. All four have raced at the U23 World Championships last season with Mills and Eliadis-Watson were part of the BW4+ that finished 6th, Egnot-Johnson finished 12th in the BW2X and Hobbs rowed in the BW1X in 2021 for Zimbabwe.
The favourites to take the title, and the only senior international crew in the event, are Leander Club and Imperial College. They are the current GB W4- and includes double Olympic champion, Helen Glover. She’s joined by three of the reigning World Champion crew, Heidi Long, Sam Redgrave and Rebecca Shorten. They are racing at the Varese World Cup and finished in silver medal position.
The rest of the field contains a competitive mix of US university crews and strong GB development and U23 crews.
Leander Club ‘A‘ has two of the crew which won U23 World Championship gold in 2021, Daisy Bellamy and Amelia Standing. They join Juliette Perry and Flo Donald. Perry rowed in the Boat Race and represented GB at the European U23 Championships. Donald rowed at the U23 World Championships in 2018 and was selected as the spare for the GB team at the European Championships this season. Three of the crew (Bellamy, Perry and Standing) raced at the Wedau Regatta in Duisburg winning the gold medal and also took the win in Championship Coxless Fours at Henley Women’s Regatta.
There are three US Universities racing, Stanford, Syracuse and Northeastern. Stanford has half of their first Varsity crew which won silver at the NCAA’s; Lettice Cabot, Annabella Bachmann, Luise Bachmann and Isabella Battistoni. Cabot raced for the USA as a junior before switching to GB and racing at the U23 World Championships winning a silver medal in the BW4-. Battistoni is an U23 World Champion in the BW8 from 2022. Luise Bachmann is also an U23 medallist, winning silver in the BW4X and her sister, Annabella, won gold in the BW8 at the European U23 Championships.
Syracuse have also brought half of their first Varsity crew. They won the ACC Championships this season and like most US Uni crews they have a mix of nationalities. Izabel Krakic is a Croatian who raced in the W2- at the senior World Championships last season. Aussie, Emmie Frederico, is part of the gold medal winning BW4+ from last season. The other two members of the crew are both Americans, Alena Criss – who raced on the US junior team in 2019, and former Princeton athlete Annika Maxson.
The third of the US crews racing is Northeastern. They are a rarity in that all four are Americans, Dalton Boyse, Grace Theobald, Lia Schlegel and Lucy Climer-Kennedy – all members of the Northeastern 2V crew.
The University of London and Leander Club composite will be strong contenders to go deep in the regatta. They have three U23 silver medallists onboard – Abigail Topp and Phoebe Snowden from the BW8 and Lauren Carey from the BW4-. The fourth member of the crew is Angharad Broughton who raced on the GB Junior team in 2019.
Oxford Brookes University will also expect to make the semi-finals at the very least, they have been racing all season, both as a 4- and as part of the Brookes W8 and have wins from the San Diego Crew Classic, Ghent, Duisburg and the Metropolitan Regattas. Their crew is Irish senior international, Claire Feerick (fifth in the W2- at the second World Cup of 2021 and an U23 silver medallist), Canadian Hailey Mercuri (who raced in the BW8 at the 2022 U23 World Championships) and Chelsea Armstrong and Beth Dutton.
Predictions
This should be a relatively comfortable win for Leander Club and Imperial College (put it this way, it’ll be a major upset if they don’t win). The most interesting thing in this event is seeing who else makes it to the final….my money is on Leander Club (depending on the draw).
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