Medals Awarded in 30 Events on Thursday at the 2022 USRowing Summer National Championships

Medals were awarded across 30 events on Thursday at the 2022 USRowing Summer National Championships on Mercer Lake in West Windsor, N.J.

Coming into today's finals, the women's double sculls race looked to be one of the best of the day, and it didn't disappoint. ARION's Lauren O'Connor and Savannah Brija chased down the Whitemarsh Boat Club composite crew of Sophia Luwis and Audrianna Boersen, who finished second in the double at the second National Selection Regatta earlier this year, in the final 10 strokes to win the race by 0.42 seconds.

"We definitely expected the high level of competition," Brija said. "The Whitemarsh crew – they were incredibly fast in the Spring, so we knew that they were going to be fast. We knew they were going to come for us, so I think we were just ready to have that fight."

O'Connor and Brija, who won the two semifinals in the women's single sculls earlier in the day, trailed coming into the last 100 meters but were able to up their rating to overtake the Whitemarsh boat for the gold. O'Connor and Brija finished with a time of 7:53.24, with Luwis and Boersen finishing in a 7:53.66. ARION's Veronica Nicacio and Megan Goodman finished third.

"It was a lot of solid racing today," O'Connor said. "There was a major change in conditions from singles to doubles, but it was really fun being up against some really fast people that we've seen throughout the season and just have a chance to really throw down against them."

Just over two hours later, Luwis and Boersen joined Elizabeth Martin and Cara Stawicki in the final of the women's quadruple sculls. The crew, which will be racing in the lightweight women's quadruple sculls final tomorrow, won the gold medal with a time of 7:26.13, finishing nearly five seconds ahead of the ARION composite boat. The ARION B boat took the bronze medal.

The second tightest race of the day was in the under 23 women's eight where the USRowing High Performance Camp edged out Vesper Boat Club by 0.6 seconds to win the gold medal. The USRowing HP boat finished with a time of 7:21.33, with Vesper clocking a 7:21.93. Greenwich Crew finished third.

In the men's pair, the Penn AC duo of Cooper Hurley and Nicholas Ruggiero outlasted the Mendota Development Camp boat of Joseph Cleary and Garrison Waugh to win the gold medal. Hurley, a member of the 2019 Pan American Games team, and Ruggiero finished with a time of 7:37.76, about four seconds ahead of the Mendota crew.

"The race was really good," Ruggiero said. "A little bit of a head wind, so conditions were kind of hard. We stayed strong through the whole thing and then we had a big sprint and pulled it out in the end."

In the under 23 men's four with coxswain, Mendota Development Camp claimed the victory in a 7:20.01. Mendota finished just over four seconds ahead of TBC Racing and Vesper Boat Club.

In the lone event of the day with national team trials implications – the lightweight men's single sculls, Texas Rowing Center's James McCullough clocked the fastest time of the day, winning the first semifinal in a time of 7:24.35. McCullough, who raced the event at the 2022 World Rowing Cup race in Poznan, Poland, last month, finished more than eight seconds ahead of Oklahoma City High Performance Center's Hilton Park. New York Athletic Club's Sam Melvin won the second semifinal in a 7:26.80, finishing three seconds ahead of Riverside Boat Club's Alex Twist. Melvin won gold in the event at the 2019 World Rowing Under 23 Championships.

Click here for today's complete results.

This week's regatta features racing in 50 boat classes in the under 23 and open categories, with 354 boats and nearly 500 rowers scheduled to race. In addition to national titles, spots on the 2022 Senior National Team will be up for grabs in 10 events, with the winners of those trials' events earning spots on the 2022 World Championships squad that will race this September in Racice, Czech Republic.

Racing concludes Friday with finals in the remaining events including all trials' events. Click here for a complete list of entries and here for tomorrow's heat sheet. Finals will be streamed live on USRowing's YouTube channel.

With the size of the USRowing Summer National Championship Regatta continuing to grow, USRowing made the decision to split the summer championships into two regattas in 2022. The second summer national championship, the USRowing Youth Summer National Championships, will be held July 15-17 on Melton Lake in Oak Ridge, Tenn., and will feature racing in 35 events in the youth, U17, and U16 categories.

While the two regattas will take place separately, clubs will still be able to race for the combined all-points trophies across both regattas. The Colgan Cup Overall Team Points Trophy, Sulgar-Barnes Men's Points Trophy, and Marion D. Ventura Women's Points Trophy will be up for grabs, with opportunities to score points at both events. Separate points trophies also will be given at the individual regattas.