Poland's LW2x, which raced here in Belgrade last year, narrowly missed out on qualifying for Paris in 2023, but won in Euro qualifying.
There are less than two weeks left until the Final Olympic/Paralympic Qualification (FOPQR) and World Cup II in Lucerne. With less than 80 days until the Games, here's a quick roundup of news and notes from the Olympics in early May. match in Paris.
Entries for FOPQR closed on Monday. The latest list of countries that have qualified so far is available on row2k's Olympic coverage resource page.
The final bid for the 2024 Olympics will be awarded to the top two finishers in the 14 Olympic rowing classes. In the Paralympic competition, the top two finishers in PR2 Mix 2x and PR3 Mix 4+ qualify, with only the winners of PR1 Singles and PR3 Mix 2x qualifying.
To keep up with the U.S. team, you can read about the U.S. team heading into qualifying in our report on the U.S. Olympic Trials. These athletes will aim to join selected crews at the camp and pre-qualified trial winners in Paris.
Ntuskos leads the way with a torch.
The honor of leading the 2024 torch relay was given to rower Stefanos Ntuskos. The Greek athlete, his M1x champion at Tokyo 202One, was the first athlete to hold the torch after it was lit.
Ntuskos followed up his relay leg with a silver medal at the Euros, finishing second behind reigning world champion Oli Zeidler of Germany. Nutuskos, who finished fourth at the World Championships in Belgrade and sixth at the Lasice competition, appears to be on track to defend his Olympic title.
No way, Norway?
Norway's female scullers set a string of historic firsts on the way to Paris. After former Calvair Inger Kavry won Norway's first W1x medal at World Cup I, she jumped on the NOR W2x for the European Championships.
The Norwegian double won a historic silver medal against Varese, and the new combination of Calvey and Thea Helseth did even better against Szeged. They won the gold medal over both Lithuania and defending world and Olympic champions Romania, giving Norway their first European championship in Olympic women's rowing.
Norway's women have picked a pretty good time to start winning medals, and it will be a first for the country no matter what color they win at the Olympics. All 14 of Norway's Olympic medals were won by men.
Check in with a Romanian
The European Championships also saw the first appearance of Romanian women, who reached six of the seven A finals in Belgrade and won five medals. At the Euros, she won three gold medals and one silver for women, plus a surprising bronze for the normally unbeatable W2xs Simona Radice and Ankuta Bodnar.
Radice won the Euro gold medal in the women's eight, and achieving both the eight and double in Paris was something she hinted to row2k during an interview with row2k in Belgrade last year, saying, “I'm definitely going to win the eight at the Olympics.'' You'll see me at the top.” game. “She doubled up at the 2022 World Championships, winning gold in both events, and she suddenly moved into the top eight.
Ladis aims for ROU W8+ gold in 2022
Unless the double result changes the calculations, his entry at Euros would seem to suggest that Radis is still in it to help Romania's W8 team win a third gold medal at the Paris Games. Romania won Olympic gold in the W8s 20 years ago in Athens, before the U.S. women started their winning streak in the W8s.
Deutschland Achter revival?
With reports that German strokeman Hannes Otzik has returned to the team, there is a good chance that Deutschland-Achter will be back in the medal contenders for Paris. Osik achieved two Olympic silver medals and three World Championship wins with his GER M8+ between 2016 and his 2021.
The return of Ochiku, and the return of fellow Tokyo silver medalist Laurits Volert to the team for the first time in two years since the World Championships, could end four years of relative turmoil for the German men's top eight. There are currently four medalists in Tokyo, including Torben Johannesen and Olaf Roggensack, who returned to the team in 2023.
Germany's Achter failed to advance to the A final in 2022, but finished fifth behind the United States in 2023. So far this season, the Germans have won silver behind Great Britain at the Euros and bronze at World Cup I. The Dutch also came in. In both cases, the Germans defeated the Romanians, whom they had won the past two seasons, and an eight-man Italian team that will go to FOPQR to compete against the United States and Canada for the final spot in Paris.
More Continental bids booked
The Asia/Oceania and European Qualification Regattas added 24 Olympic qualifiers and 5 Paralympic qualifiers to the Paris list in April. Prior to FOPQR, a total of 57 countries have qualified for the Olympic Games and 24 countries have qualified for the Paralympic Games.
At the Asia/Oceania Regatta, Tokyo silver medalist Anna Prakatan took first place and qualified for her second Olympics. Prakatan, who currently races for Uzbekistan, finished in the C final at the 2023 World Championships.
Prakatan (UZB) raced in Belgrade last year
Almost seven months after narrowly missing out on the final stroke of the Belgrade B final, Bulgarian sculler Kristian Vasilev has finally qualified for Paris in the European qualifiers. He placed second in Euro qualifying, with Nikolai Pimenov, who is currently racing for Serbia, winning the first place bid, and Belgian Tim Bliss, who placed first in the 2023 World Championship C final, in third place. and won the last spot.
Ukraine's light men's doubles team also qualified by defeating Belgium to take one of the two spots and send Poland to the final qualifying round. Although the Ukrainian team did not advance to the C final in Belgrade, the Polish and Belgian teams were among the top runners at the World Championship in the European race in which they competed for qualification.
UKR LM2x in Belgrade
Lobnig update
In the last roundup, we announced that Austria's Magdalena Lobnig had suffered a serious injury, but it looks like this month's W1x Tokyo medalist has some good news.
Once the FOPQR entry comes out, we'll know more about whether Lobnig, who has already qualified in the singles, intends to qualify in the doubles with her sister.
podium proposal
In Belgrade, I saw a proposal on the return float, but you can do better if you're Ukrainian PR3 athlete Stanislav Samolik and his soon-to-be fiancée is mixed doubles partner Darya Kotyk. must.
Samolyuk asked the following question on the European Championship podium:
lucerne loom
The next and final step in assembling the venue for Paris 2024 will be the Lucerne Regatta of Death. Racing at FOPQR begins on May 19th, with entries available here on the World Rowing site during the week of the event.
Later that same week will be World Cup II, the first international race of the season for the U.S. team.
You can follow row2k's complete Olympic coverage throughout the Paris Olympics and Paralympics.