Last Updated: 30.Jul.2019

This past weekend saw eight of our U23 Green Racing Project athletes racing at the U23 World Championships held in Sarasota, Florida at Nathan-Benderson Park. The Men’s Quadruple Sculls (BM4x), Men’s Double Sculls (BM2x), and Women’s Lightweight Double Sculls (BLW2x) representing the United States all came from Craftsbury’s summer program that offers U23 athletes the opportunity to train and race under the GRP. It was an exciting week of racing full of uncertainty being thrown at the schedule by storms rolling through the area. 

Racing started on the morning of the 24th with the Heat for our BM4x consisting Thomas Johnson of Virginia Commonwealth University, Jack Reid of Trinity College, Samuel Gatsos of Colgate University, and Nathan Phelps of Princeton University. They placed fourth in their heat, sending them to their repechage on the morning of the 25th. They placed fourth in their repechage, three seconds shy of third place Poland. Only the top three boats advanced to the semifinals, eliminating the 4x from racing progression.

Our next boat to race was the BM2x consisting of Cole Dorsey of George Washington University and Mark Couwenhoven of the University of Maryland Baltimore County. On the morning of the 25th they also placed fourth in their heat, sending them to their repechage on the morning of the 26th. Dorsey and Couwenhoven advanced comfortably to their A/B Semifinal with a margin of eight seconds over Japan. They placed fifth in their Semifinal on the 27th, sending them to the B Final. Dorsey and Couwenhoven then threw down a great race in the B Final with a strong fight with Switzerland to the 1500m mark for third place. They ended up finishing fourth in the B Final, placing them 10th overall at the U23 World Championships.

Our final boat to race was the BLW2x consisting of Grace Joyce of the University of Wisconsin and Liza Ray of Columbia University. Joyce and Ray started out racing with a strong performance, walking through China in the final 500 who had led the race for the first 1500m and beating them by 0.7 seconds. Finishing second in their Heat advanced them directly to the A final three days later. In the A Final they held onto fifth place until the 1000m mark where they fell back to finish sixth overall at the U23 World Championships.

The Center is extremely proud of our U23 athletes who raced hard and represented themselves, the United States, and the GRP well. Some of them will be returning home now with several returning to the Center to gear up for Canadian Henley next week with the rest of our U23 squad and senior women. Go Green and Go USA!

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