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Team GB Rowing under way in Paris with two A Finals secured on day one of the Olympic Rowing Regatta

Team GB rowers kicked off their Olympic campaign at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium in Paris, both quadruple sculls crews through to their A finals and the Women’s double sculls through to their A/B semi final

It was another dominant row for the Women’s quadruple sculls (W4x) of Lauren Henry, Hannah Scott, Lola Anderson and Georgie Brayshaw. They led throughout and won their heat, finishing 4 seconds faster than the Dutch, who won the first heat. They are now through to the final on Wednesday.

Georgie said: “The first race I always feel is the most nerve wracking – figuring out how the field has moved on. Now it’s just building on that for the final. It’s about remembering that this is the same 2km lake as everywhere else I’ve ever rowed – just trying to block out everything else that’s happening. It’s the Olympics and it’s so special but that doesn’t matter when we’re racing, we’ll think about that later.”

Lauren said: “It’s very exciting to get the first race down and take the win from the heat. I think now we focus, keep very internal and focus our intention of preparing ourselves as best as we can for Wednesday’s final. That’s where the big dance is, the race we’ve been preparing for all this time. Really pleased but excited to see what we can do on Wednesday. “

On being favourites, Lola added: “We try to block out all the noise of coming in as favourites. We have had seasons before where we’ve come in as underdogs and had great results, then come in as favourites and havent come on top. It doesn’t make any difference to us, we just try to respond to whatever the crews are doing on the day and move with them.”

Photo credit: Steve McArthur / Row360

The Men’s quadruple sculls (M4x) of Tom Barras, Callum Dixon, Matt Haywood and Graeme Thomas are also through to Wednesday’s final, with a second place finish in their heat.

Callum said: “What gives us confidence is this saying we’ve always had – the water, the wind and the waves don’t know it’s the Olympic Games. So it’s different because you’ve got five other boats side by side but internally we’re running the same processes, rowing the same patterns. There’s a lot of confidence to be taken from that.”

On making his Olympic debut, Matt said: “It was really good to get my first race in at my first Olympics. We’ve definitely got a lot of stuff to work on, but it was a good first round to get done. All eyes on the final next week. I think you’ve got to think of this as another race – as soon as you start to think about it as an Olympics, nerves will build and panic starts to set in. It’s just another race – there are less crews and we’ve faced them all before. It’s the same people, we have to focus on that.

“The thing that’s so different is the crowd – there are so many people. This is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before. From the 1000m mark you have people screaming and shouting the whole way, and to know my family and friends are there and supporting from home, it really adds to it.”

Photo credit: Steve McArthur / Row360

The first race of the day saw Becky Wilde and Mathilda Hodgkins Byrne finish second in the Women’s double sculls (W2x), booking their place in the semi final.

Becky said: “I think that was a really solid start, we’ve all had really great training camps so I’m glad we could go out and show that in our race today. It’s a relief that we got to the start line in one piece, it’s a dream come true. I’m really glad we have had a good start to the regatta.”

Mathilda added: “This Olympics is so different to the last one now that I’m a mum. I’m grateful that I have friends and family out here – we have a big support network and that really helps. We’re learning every time, this is the first time we’ve avoided the repechage. We’ve had some solid training blocks so I’m excited to see what we can do each time we race. From all three heats the results are all over the place so I can’t predict who will be in the final, but it’s a very exciting event to be a part of.”

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