Aus Eight Miss Olympic Qualification

The Australian women’s eight has missed the opportunity to qualify the boat for next year’s Rio Olympics at the 2015 Rowing World Championships in France.

Having missed out on the A Final after finishing outside of the top two in the repechage, the Australian eight, featuring WAIS athletes and 2012 Olympians Alex Hagan and Hannah Vermeersch, contested the B Final, recording a second place finish, for an eighth ranking over all.

Having missed automatic qualification, Rowing Australia will be required to look at alternate options to earn a Rio 2016 place for both the men’s and women’s eight crews, with neither able to secure an A Final spot and guaranteed qualification.

WAIS program coach Rhett Ayliffe led the Australian men’s double scull combination of Alexander Belonogoff and James McRae to a fifth place finish in their A Final in a high quality contest won by Croatia’s Sinkovic brothers.

Former WAIS scholarship holder David Watts and the Australian men’s quad scull crew collected a silver medal, qualifying their boat for the Games in the process.

Kim Crow’s gold medal in the women’s single scull, to go with Australia’s two silver medals saw the nation finish seventh on the medal table, with New Zealand topping the list with five gold.