WAIS Rowers to Contest Seat Trials for National Selection
The 2013 Australian Rowing Team Selection Trials will kick-off Tuesday 22 April with National Team Selection up for grabs in the Senior A, Para Rowing, World University Games, Under 23 and Junior teams.
64 athletes have been invited to contest selection for the Australian Senior A team to compete at the 2013 World Rowing Championships to be held in Chungju, South Korea (25 August – 1 September 2013 ).
These include 17 members of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic team who are now aiming for selection into the first World Rowing Championships team of the new Olympiad on the road to the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
The WAIS rowing program has seven athletes competing seat trials, with 2012 London Olympians Hannah Vermeersch and Alex Hagan headlining the group.
Vermeersch – who hails from Esperance – and Hagan – from Bunbury – will aim to secure selection in the Australian team, when they compete in the women’s pair. Selection will be ranked by priority boat, with the women’s pair preferred, ahead of the women’s U23 pair, with a squad then making up the women’s eight crew.
Fellow WAIS athletes Maia Simmonds and Hannah Jansen will race in the lightweight women’s single scull, with those races to be ranked and seat raced via the section priority of women’s double scull, women’s quad scull and an U23 double scull.
WAIS athlete Perry Ward will contest the men’s single lightweight scull, which will follow a similar process to the women’s, with the lightweight men’s double scull first priority, ahead of lightweight four and the lightweight men’s quadrupled four.
Matt Cochran will race in the men’s single scull and Tom Gatti in the men’s pair, with both events to determine priority boats in the men’s eight and U23 men’s eight.
The 2013 National Selection Trials will be held at Sydney International Regatta Centre in Penrith from April 22 – May 3 2013. The Teams will be announced following the selection trials.
– with Rowing Australia