The retooled Island-based defending Olympic-champion Canadian women’s eight began its journey to Paris 2024 where it left off last year in Tokyo — on the podium at the 2022 world rowing championships in Racice, Czech Republic.
It was two levels lower than in Tokyo, with bronze Sunday in Racice, but still notable in that the crew has undergone major turnover in the year since winning Olympic gold.
“We didn’t feel any pressure [as Olympic champions] as it is always a new story,” said coxswain Kristen Kit, in a statement.
“We just started this new story today in lead up to Paris 2024. For us, this is brand new.”
The four returnees from the Tokyo Olympic-champion women’s eight crew include Kit, University of Victoria Vikes graduate Avalon Wasteneys of Campbell River, Sydney Payne of Mill Bay and Kasia Gruchalla-Wesierski. The five newcomers to the boat are Kirsten Edwards and Alexis Cronk, both from the UVic Vikes, Morgan Rosts out of the NCAA Div. 1 University of Virginia Cavaliers and Jessica Sevick and Gabrille Smith, the latter two who placed sixth in the double at the Tokyo Olympics.
“We went out and we wanted to have a race that we would have no regrets, and could be proud of every stroke, and I think we did that,” said Payne, a graduate of Brentwood College.
Romania won gold over the 2,000-metre course in six minutes, 01.14 seconds, Netherlands silver in 6:05.04 and Canada bronze in 6:07.59.
The Island-based Canadian men’s eight placed fifth in the world championships Sunday but the biggest storyline is that they advanced to the final at all after being away from racing at this level for several years.
The Canadian men’s eight came out of Elk Lake to win Olympic gold medals at Los Angeles in 1984, Barcelona in 1992, Beijing in 2008 and silver at London in 2012. That was followed by a low period in which Canada could not muster enough rowers to even enter a men’s eight at the Rio 2016 or Tokyo 2020 Olympics. But this once-mighty Canadian category is being resurrected with high hopes for the future. Top-five in the world is a good start in that quest.
“There is a lot of excitement and I think this moment has been coming for a while,” said crew-member Peter Lancashire of Victoria, out of Brentwood College and the University of Washington Huskies.
The Canadian teams trained over the summer at Quamichan Lake, Shawnigan Lake and Elk Lake to prepare for the worlds.
