Eight days to stage one of the Rowing World Cup
Rowers from 46 nations will be competing in the first leg
of the 2006 Rowing World Cup to be held in Munich, Germany
from 25 to 27 May. A record number of 750 athletes will row
in 340 boats at the Munich Olympic Rowing Course. The course
was the venue of the 1972 Olympic regatta, and will be host
to the 2007 World Rowing Championships in August next year.
The highest number of entries are from the host nation and
winner of last year’s Rowing World Cup Overall Trophy,
Germany, with 85 athletes entered. Last year’s runners
up in the World Cup points race Italy and Great Britain have
entered 54 and 49 athletes, respectively.
Worth a mention is the very high entry from China, with 23
crews entered in 13 events. Is this an indication of Chinese
rowing getting geared up for racing at the 2008 Beijing Olympics?
Always faithful to her position in the women’s single
scull, World Champion Ekaterina Karsten from Belarus will
be defending her status as Rowing World Cup leader once again
this year. In the absence of New Zealand’s 2005 World
Champion Mahe Drysdale at this first stage of the World Cup,
the men’s single’s field will be a battle between
Olympic gold medallist from Norway Olaf Tufte, 2005 World
Cup winner in Ondrej Synek from the Czech Republic, last weekend’s
Duisburg winner Marcel Hacker of Germany and a hefty field
of 36 new and old names in this event including a promising
race-off between Slovenia’s star rowers and 2005 World
Rowing male crew of the year award winners Iztok Cop and Luka
Spik.
This first stage of the 2006 Rowing World Cup is a chance
for many nations to test out some new combinations in real-time
conditions as they get geared up for the rest of the World
Cup season and the World Rowing Championships in Eton, Great
Britain from 20 to 27 August.
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