World Rowing Coastal Championships Underway in Saundersfoot

The 2022 World Rowing Coastal Championships got underway on Friday in Saundersfoot, Great Britain, with heats in the women's solo, women's quadruple sculls with coxswain, and men's double sculls events.

In the women's quadruple sculls with coxswain, both USA crews advanced to Sunday's finals, finishing second and third, respectively, behind Spain's RCMD Málaga. The two Next Level Rowing boats got out to the early lead before Málaga was able to grab the top spot and the victory. RCMD Málaga finished with a time of 19:21.33, with the USA 2 crew of Jillian Zeiff, Morgan Hummel, Jeni Sorli, Olivia Farrar, and coxswain Coral Kasden finishing second, a little less than 10 seconds behind in a 19:31.10. The USA 1 crew of Christine Cavallo, Dani Hansen, Brooke Wolford, Julia Lindsay, and coxswain Peter Choi took third in a 19:39.33.

"We popped out pretty quickly ahead, and then right around that first buoy, we were feeling it. I felt like we were just taking off," Wolford said. "Then my oarlock opened up on the left side; my starboard oar went a little crazy. I caught the oar, and I pulled my oars in, and I put it back in. I couldn't feel my left hand, but I was like, 'I need to get this locked before I start rowing again, because that's the only way we're going to get through this.' We were still ahead at that point. It was a tussle."

In the women's solo event, Park City Rowing Academy's Dayna Deuter finished 12th in the first heat and will now race in Saturday's B final. With the top nine advancing, Deuter clocked a 34:42.37, finishing more than two minutes off an A final spot. Azerbaijan's Diana Dymchenko and France's Jessica Berra took the top two spots, with Dymchenko clocking a 25:52.88 to finish 35 seconds ahead of Berra. In the second heat, New Orleans Rowing Club's Hannah Huppi finished 14th and also will race in the B final. Huppi got off the line well but ran into some trouble after the first marker. She finished with a time of 28:27.43. Janneke van der Meulen, representing Rv Willem 3 Amsterdam, won the race in a 24:29.06, less than three seconds ahead of Miriam Sheehan out of Ireland's Castletownbere Rowing Club.

Next Level Rowing's Gary Rought and Malachi Anderson finished eighth in the second heat of the men's double sculls and will race in tomorrow's B final. With six to advance, Rought and Anderson clocked a 21:13.60 to finish 35 seconds off a qualifying spot for the A final. The Italian duo of Giacomo Costa and Eduardo Marchetti from RC Genovese 1890 won the race in a 19:07.60, with Moritz Korthals and Emil Schmidberger from Gerrmany's Stuttgarter RC finishing second.

For today's complete results, click here.

Four USA boats will hit the water for the first time on Saturday. The U.S. has two entries in the men's quadruple sculls with coxswain, with one crew entered in both the mixed double sculls and women's double sculls. The remaining heats and the first set of B finals will take place on Saturday. The A finals and the remaining B finals will be held Sunday.

In total, more than 540 rowers in 235 boats from 23 countries are competing in Wales. The schedule, start lists, results, and live event updates will be available on www.worldrowing.com. Live audio will be available for all races on www.worldrowing.com, but there will be no live video streaming for the event.