GEAROID TOWEY, one of the three competitors still in the running for the Olympic double scull, has set an early standard at this weekend's Lucerne Regatta by winning his second heat and securing, a place in today's lightweight single sculls semi final.
With only the winner going through, Towey was lying second, half a length behind his Croatian opponent at the halfway mark but was under rating him by around three strokes a minute. The economy showed in the closing stretch where Towey raced through to win by a relatively comfortable two seconds, without having to raise his rate.
The other two thirds of the sculling squad, Niall O'Toole and Brendan Dolan, rowed out their heat which included World Champions Switzerland and Italy, currently the fastest crew this year. We were rowing with them when one of my gates slipped out by maybe a centimetre and we wound down - we decided to save our powder for the repechage.
Emmet O'Brien's bid to regain his place in the sculling, squad may be at an end after he finished first race in a single scull since winning the National Championship last year, in fourth place, 19 seconds behind Towey.
Eager to prove the sculling management wrong, O'Brien had funded his own way to Lucerne after being told days before the Duisberg regatta that he didn't figure in the final selection.
The coxless four continue their training for next weekend's Olympic qualifying regatta with Maxwell O'Connor Lynch and Holland having confirmed their places after last minute seat racing at Blessington, they follow the form and quality, Neil Duty - the lone representative from Northern Ireland - will travel to Atlanta as one of two reserves. The other, will he either Neptune's Adrian Smith or Commercial's Sean Heaney.
The Shannon heavyweight pair, Brian Collins and Fergal O'Callaghan finished last in their heat. They will race tomorrow with the double, O'Brien and Mary Hussey - third behind the Belgian Annalies Breadael in the repechages.
Only a fortnight ago, Collins and O'Callaghan swept the board at Cork taking titles at Senior pair, four and eight. Today, at the Metropolitan Regatta, Leander Trophy winners St Michael's will have to do without their guesting stern pair against stiffer opposition. Neptune and Trinity stand out from a large entry which for some will be the first and last opportunity to race the full 2,000 metre championship distance before the real thing next month.
Both clubs are fielding - unchanged line ups from the Trinity Regatta race that saw Neptune intimidate their way to their first clear Senior 1 eights win this season. Then, the race was decided by aggressive coxing on the Islandbridge bends, but today it's more likely to be the weather that proves more influential.
Whipped up conditions have been a regular feature of Blessington regattas and strong winds over the past week have disrupted training on the lake. If the askew head wind doesn't force abandonment, it may favour crews drawn in the lower numbered lanes.
After early season experimentation, the Neptune eight seems to have settled and problems to have been ironed out. "The eight has a formula that works at the moment and after Metro we'll be racing an Open eight and fours at Docklands," said club captain Gerry Farrell.
"We want to make our selection for Henley and racing against the top English crews there should allow us to see whether our best chance lies in the Thames eights or Britannia fours."
Trinity's early, morning sessions have remained unaffected by exam timetables, and captain elect, Mark Pollock is confident that the eight will regain the initiative after what he describes as a bit of complacency at their home event. Queens will race an eight with just one change from the University Championships captain Seamus Linden replacing Paul Moore at seven.
When they raced Trinity last, the eight finished four lengths behind but still cut an earlier deficit by seven seconds.
"We felt we had a bit of a dead spot a minute or so into the race so we've been working on the concentration," says the number two Gareth Ingram. Little, therefore, could be taken from last week's three quarter length win over Coleraine at the Lagan Sprints and exams have also necessitated fill ins for training.
Defence Forces again double up their senior 3 eight in the Senior 1 event with Smyth coming in for Mike Curran at two. Commercial's Colm Maffney has been rowing as part of UCD set up for the last month and rows bow with them today.
Tribesmen's hopes at the start of the winter of building a championship eight have since been dogged by internal wrangles between junior and senior team mates and were finally dashed when their junior international Ray Carroll received a season's suspension for rowing as a novice with Cork RTC in last, month's University Championships.
In footballing parlance, it's left them free to concentrate on the fours with a strong coxed entry led by a recent junior champion, Kevin Boyle ar stroke and backed up by Gearoid Mitchell, Peter Brady and lightweight squad member Paul Flannery in the bow.
Up until the 1970s, the Blue Riband event, was the nearest thing to an official championship race and Tribes' this year find themselves drawn against Trinity, St Michael's and Neptune in a straight final.
