Two crews advanced from the qualifiers to the A-final, and the American crew made a strong push from the beginning, running within the top two or three places in the first half of the race, but ultimately were unable to maintain their momentum in the second half of the race and moved on to the B-final.
Grace Joyce – It's very disappointing, but there's another race in two days, so the rankings are still up for grabs. I think I ran well today, but my pace dropped at the end. The challenge is to see what I can learn from today for the B-final.
row2k – Can you tell us a bit about how you approached this high stakes race? You gave it your all and it was fun to watch. How did you feel in the opening part of the race and how do you plan to develop it from here? There is still a chance for this boat to place better than last year's quad.
Emily Deleman – In the last race, we saw that the Olympic boats were very fast from the start, faster than any other international competition. After the first race, we knew we wanted to get in the race quickly, so we put all our effort into the first kilometer, hoping to join the pack. We gave it our all, but in the end, I feel like we didn't have what it took to finish the race where we wanted to. But like Grace said, I'm very proud of us for being courageous.
row2k – How did your first 1k go? What was your base speed?
Thiel Cohen – It was good. We definitely had a headwind and we knew concentrating on split times wasn't going to work. There's no point in doing that in these conditions. We knew we had to stay in the pack and I think we did that. That was a big goal going into the race. So, as you two (Joyce and Deleman) said, it's disappointing, but I think in the first half we really pushed ourselves and gave it our all.
row2k – You guys have been through a lot of races, so when all of a sudden you have a final that's a little bit different than what you wanted, what do you say to yourself? How do you deal with it mentally?
Lauren O'Connor – I think you just have to make the most of it. You have to give it your all, take the race as it comes and have a short memory. The goal is to finish as high as possible. It's not over yet, so you just have to do what you can.
Full results from today's racing can be found here and for more information on spectating the Olympic regatta, check out row2k's Olympic resources page.
