The British national anthem played out three times across the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium on the final day of the Paralympic Rowing Regatta, as all four of the ParalympicsGB boats took home a medal.

Lauren Rowles became the first rower from any country to win three Paralympic gold medals as she and her PR2 Mixed double sculls (PR2 Mix 2x) partner, Paralympic debutant and former Royal Engineer Commando, Gregg Stevenson won in fine style pulling ahead of the Chinese in the final 500m of the race to take their place at the top of the podium, maintaining their unbeaten streak during the Paris cycle.

Credit: Benedict Tufnell / British Rowing

Lauren said: “Out of my three Paralympic gold medals, this is definitely the best one yet! To do it for the third time in a row – history was made today. To have a bit of the Eiffel Tower in these medals and to do it with Gregg has been incredible – he’s been the best part about it.

“In our event, people go out there hard. It’s the Paralympic finals so you show up or you show out and today China showed up. They’ve been chasing us for years now and I knew today they would give it some. We wanted to push them to the absolute limit and today we knew we had that speed and surge coming into the finish line.

“We’ve never seen the audience so packed out in rowing before, and I think that really shows how Paralympic sport is going. Gregg’s got two young boys and I’ve got my son Noah who is five months old now, and it’s about a lot more than medals now, it’s about being role models to the boys. Our families and partners are our absolute rocks, Jude has been alone single parenting for five weeks now whilst I’ve been in a boat with Gregg. Our families allow us to achieve this, so it goes without saying that these medals today are for our families and for our boys.”

Greg said:  “Having Lauren and our coach Nick Baker around is all the experience I needed to race that race. For the last few months we’ve said we’ve got to race until the last stroke and that our competition will bring something you don’t expect. I was really impressed with China, what a row for them! They took us right to the end and as soon as I felt we had the momentum I had this little grimace and a smile, like ‘we’re going!’. This is epic. To turn up, work hard, be a role model for my kids and hang out with Lauren who works hard and just achieves is the cherry on top.”

Credit: Benedict Tufnell / British Rowing

The PR1 Men’s single sculls (PR1 M1x) saw GB’s Benjamin Pritchard win an incredible gold medal, finishing 11.37 seconds ahead of Ukraine’s Roman Polianskyi in silver. Benjamin’s phenomenal regatta started with a Paralympic Best Time in the heats and ended as Paralympic Champion.

Ben said: “It’s been all about today and the process. It came off and now I have a gold medal. We are athletes as well as disabled people. We have to do the hard work that athletes do on top of living our disabilities in day to day life. There may be kids with spinal injuries who want to be doctors, producers, artists, whatever it may be – they should be encouraged to do whatever they want to do. The more visibility we have in front of and behind the scenes the better.”

“I had to stay in my lane to do what I did. People have tried different things to win over the past few years – people are rapid off the start in this boat class. But you have to be realistic – it’s a 2,000m race. I stayed in my lane and didn’t know how far ahead I was, but as long as Roman was in my sight – I knew he was what I had to worry about. I’ve beaten him twice here on this lake, so I knew I could do it. Our whole field has moved on 24 seconds in the past three years, any one of the 5 athletes who have raced 2K in under 9 minutes could have gotten gold today. It’s the closest the PR1 Men’s single sculls field has ever been, we haven’t won a gold medal in the PR1 Men’s single sculls field since 2011, so this feels really special.”

The PR3 Mixed coxed four (PR3 Mix4+), Great Britain’s most successful boat, is now unbeaten for 14 years after Frankie Allen, Giedre Rakauskaite, Josh O’Brien, Ed Fuller and cox Erin Kennedy added to a thriving legacy in the final race of the Paralympic Rowing Regatta.

Giedre said: “It’s been fourteen years of winning for this boat, but I think every single year has been pushing us on. We’ve been taking trust from the teammates before us, there has always been an overlap of at least one or two athletes from previous Games so we draw what we can from them and keep pushing on and try to make them proud.

Credit: Benedict Tufnell / British Rowing

“Eighteen years ago today I was in a car accident that led me to becoming a Paralympic athlete. It’s an anniversary that I’m going to celebrate now with a gold medal. Every year this is going to be a golden moment. The Paralympic Games is like a second chance. I always wanted to be an athlete when I was a child, and I thought that chance was taken from me and finding out in my 20s that I can still pursue my dream as a Paralympian was something that I latched on to and clearly didn’t give up.”

Erin paid credit to the crew and the reserves in the squad: “This project has had so many people involved – someone we really want to give a shout out to is Morgan Fice-Noyes, he has been with us in training and the the sixth member of this crew this year.”

Keeping it short and sweet, Josh said: “I took my first stroke in the same season I won gold, so it’s pretty surreal.”

Making their ParalympicsGB debut in the PR3 Mixed double sculls (PR3 Mix 2x) were Sam Murray and Annie Caddick, who also made history as the first crew to win silver in this new boat class.

Sam: “It’s surreal at this moment, we’re trying to take stock of it all but we’re proud of our performance. I didn’t think this was even on my horizon. I left rowing and I was content with where I’d got to – and then it was at the start of the 2023 season when I met Annie, spoke to our Head Coach Nick Baker and realised we could make a crack of this, and now we have a silver medal!”

Annie added: “It was such a tight race with everyone right there – the adrenaline rush the whole time was going. We didn’t settle, we had to keep pushing. At the end Sam said “we’ve got to go!” and I felt him surge, I had to hold on and go with him. We’ve built trust and a bond, so no matter how bad you’re feeling – if one of us goes, we both go. Having this medal means a lot. It’s been a long journey to get here, I’m so proud of us.”

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Two-time Paralympic champion Lauren Rowles and her PR2 Mixed double sculls (PR2 Mix 2x) partner, former Royal Engineer Commando, Gregg Stevenson, flew down the track in a World and Paralympic record breaking time of 7:56.92 to beat their previous World Best Time, set in 2023. The result means they qualify directly to Sunday’s A final.

Speaking after the race, Lauren said: “It feels phenomenal. We’ve been promising the fans, and importantly our partners, that we were going to come out and do a World Best Time. We’ve been saying sub-8 minutes for a really long time so it’s nice to deliver what we’ve been trying to do for the last couple of years together so this felt really good. Personally, I’ve been working myself to try and do sub-8 minutes and push this field out to where it’s never been before and today we’ve done that.”

Gregg, thrilled with the result and making his Paralympic debut aged 39, said: “I’m finally a Paralympian, I’ve done it! It feels unbelievable, especially having this crowd here and my wife and two boys. The past few days have been phenomenal. I’m really enjoying it.”

The PR3 Mixed coxed four (PR3 Mix4+), Great Britain’s most successful boat, continued its impressive 13 year winning streak also clocking up a World and Paralympic Best Time of 6:43.68. The crew Frankie Allen, Giedre Rakauskaite, Josh O’Brien and Ed Fuller and cox, Erin Kennedy, were the fastest across both heats, and are also directly through to the A Final on Sunday.

Commenting on the World Best Time, and making his Paralympic Games debut, Ed said: “You can’t ask for more than that. We knew with our training leading into today that we had quick conditions. Everything came together for us out there and we performed well in that race. Overall it was a solid performance and we now have three more Paralympians in the crew so very happy to be able to call ourselves that.”

On her Paralympic Games experience, Giedre said: “It’s nice to be surrounded by all the athletes in our Para GB building in the village. We’re proud to represent GB and everyone is incredibly supportive, we just want to add to that greatness. The bar is high across all the sports and we want to match it!”

The PR1 Men’s single sculls (PR1 M1x) saw GB’s Benjamin Pritchard achieve a Paralympic Best Time of 8:51.26 and take the one direct place in Sunday’s final. After the race, he said: “I’m really happy. It’s always good to cross the line first but most importantly the times I’ve seen in training are coming to fruition during racing. It’s good to not worry about who is around you, focus on what you’re doing, and trust your body because you know what you’ve been doing in the winter and you know what will work.

“I set a Paralympic Best Time in the repechage in Tokyo and now I’ve done it here, but the goal is a World Record. Nick (Nick Baker, Coach) will tell me off for stopping before the line, but sometimes you need to save a little bit of energy and savour the moment. That’s why I stopped – I knew I had the win, the roar from the crowd was incredible. There was lighting – seeing the lightning strike, it was just a picture. I sat there like ‘this is cool’. I wanted to savour the moment because you don’t get those much in racing. Today felt like the biggest crowd we’ve ever had at a World Rowing regatta and it’s not even sold out – Sunday is sold out, so it’s just going to get better and better. We’ll hope for the same result on Sunday, and if not I know that I’ve put myself in the fight of trying to get a medal and race against the world’s best, which is what you want to do.”

Making their Paralympics GB debut in the PR3 Mixed double sculls (PR3 Mix 2x) were Sam Murray and Annie Caddick who missed out on the automatic qualification spot by just under a second, and will now race again in Saturday’s repechage. Sam said: “It feels good to get our first run down and get the experience of racing here – it’s the start of our weekend.”

Annie added: “We know we’re in the mix, that’s what that race taught us. We know we have to be a bit stronger off the start, but now we can learn from this and hopefully deliver tomorrow  in the repechage.”

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Of the five women and five men, six will make their Paralympic debuts while four are returning Paralympians – including two-time Paralympic champion Lauren Rowles and Tokyo 2020 gold medallists, Giedre Rakauskaite and Erin Kennedy.

“The past achievements of ParalympicsGB’s rowing squads speak for themselves – as a group their hard work, dedication and innate talent consistently pays off, and this squad of 10 athletes – who have already made an indelible mark on the World and European stage – is no different. I’m delighted to welcome all 10 athletes to the ParalympicsGB team for Paris 2024 and can’t wait to see them in action in Paris this summer,” commented ParalympicsGB Chef de Mission, Penny Briscoe.

Commenting on the team selection, British Rowing Head of Olympic and Paralympic Performance Delivery, Tom Dyson, who will be Rowing Team Leader in Paris, said: “Rowing is consistently a top performing sport for ParalympicsGB and we’ll be looking to reinforce that in Paris. While our selected athletes are a blend of returning Tokyo 2020 Paralympians and those for whom Paris will be their first Games, every one of them has a Paralympic, World, European or World Cup gold medal to their credit. When you combine those rowers with a world-class group of coaches and support staff, we are all excited to show the world what the team has trained to deliver in Paris!”

PR2 Mixed double sculls (PR2 Mix2x)

Two-time Paralympic champion Lauren Rowles is joined by former Royal Engineer Commando, Gregg Stevenson, who is making his Paralympic debut at the age of 39. ParalympicsGB were gold medallists in this class at both Tokyo 2020 and Rio 2016.

Lauren and Gregg qualified their boat for the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games at the 2023 World Rowing Championships in a World Best Time (WBT) of 08:00.57 – the third WBT of their debut season. They remain unbeaten going into these Games.

Lauren said: “It’s my third Games but it feels more exciting than my first. For your first Games there’s so much excitement but you don’t know what you’re getting yourself in for whereas now I know what to expect. It’s going to be so great to experience the Opening and Closing Ceremonies and have friends and family in the stands cheering us on. Our lives have been changed through rowing and we want to show the fans what that means to us!”

Gregg added: “This feels like a long time coming. I had the ambition during the Invictus Games days, around 2018, but never thought I would achieve it, so it’s been quite a journey! I’m so proud of the work that we’ve done to get to this point. The whole Stevenson family, including my wife and boys, will be there in Paris to cheer us on!”

PR3 Mixed coxed four (PR3 Mix4+)

Great Britain’s most successful boat will aim to maintain its impressive 13 year – including three Paralympic Games – winning streak in Paris. The new-look crew sees Tokyo 2020 gold medallists Giedre Rakauskaite and cox Erin Kennedy joined by Paralympic debutants Frankie Allen, Ed Fuller and Josh O’Brien.

Josh made his GB Rowing team debut, winning gold, at the 2024 European Championships. Speaking about his selection, he said: “The last few months have been a total whirlwind with trials and racing and now I’m selected for the Paralympics, it’s so exciting! I only started rowing two years ago at Birmingham University, so it’s all happened very quickly. Thanks so much to all the coaches who taught me to row at Birmingham and the coaches and my teammates at our national training centre in Caversham who have taught me so much in a short space of time. I’ve wanted to become a Paralympian for a while and I don’t think it’s sunk in yet… it’s so massive!”

Frankie added: “This is a dream come true. We have done so much hard work to get to this point and I want to make the most of all the experiences from now until the Games. The pressure of the unbeaten legacy in this boat is a privilege that I’m hugely proud to be a part of.”

PR1 Men’s single sculls (PR1 M1x)

Benjamin Pritchard came fifth at the delayed Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. Since then, he has developed into a consistent medallist, winning two World Championship bronze medals across 2022 and 2023. Last month, at the final race before Paris 2024, Benjamin won his first career gold medal at the World Rowing Cup in Poznan, Poland. The PR1 men’s single is a hotly contested, highly competitive boat class, where Benjamin will be looking to improve on his Tokyo performance.

Benjamin said: “I feel more prepared for Paris than I was for Tokyo, particularly as I’ve had the full cycle to build more race experience and more speed. Obviously this is the closest thing to a home Games and it will be great to have so much support from friends and family out there. I want it to be a big party and celebration of the hard work that we’ve put in over the past eight years.”

PR3 Mixed double sculls (PR3 Mix2x)

Rowing for ParalympicsGB in this new boat class at the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games will be Sam Murray and Annie Caddick. For Sam, this new event will see him fulfil a Paralympic aspiration that started at a talent identification event back in 2007 where he was first noted as a potential rower. Sam and Annie have rowed together since 2023 and were recently crowned European champions. They are excited to be making their Paralympic debuts in this inaugural event of the PR3 Mixed double sculls.

Sam said: “We’ve put so much work in and for me personally it’s been a long journey of being in and out of the squad for a number of years, so now to be selected for Paris, it’s very exciting. Part of the lure of coming back was to race in this new event and being so close to home is a bonus as so many people are coming out to support us.”

Annie said: “Each day it gets a bit closer and I get a little more excited and a little more nervous. Sam and I have built a great partnership and we are looking forward to being the first to represent Great Britain in this boat class. The competition is fierce and the standard is very close, so I think we’ll see some exciting racing!”

Paralympic Regatta Results and more

The ParalympicsGB crews racing at the 2024 Paris Paralympic Games are:

PR3 Mixed coxed four (PR3 Mix4+)

Frankie Allen (Oxford Brookes University BC)
Josh O’Brien (Molesey BC)
Giedre Rakauskaite (Worcester RC)
Ed Fuller (Reading University BC/Nautilus RC)
Erin Kennedy (cox) (Leander Club)
Coach: Nicola Benavente 

PR3 Mixed double sculls (PR3 Mix2x)

Sam Murray (Molesey BC)
Annie Caddick (Molesey BC)
Coach: Nicola Benavente

PR2 Mixed double sculls (PR2 Mix2x)

Lauren Rowles (Birmingham RC)
Gregg Stevenson (Agecroft RC)
Coach: Nick Baker 

PR1 Men’s single sculls (PR1 M1x)

Benjamin Pritchard (City of Swansea RC)
Coach: Nick Baker

Paralympic Games rowing coaching staff, Team Management and Support staff

Tom Dyson: Team Leader
Nick Baker: Head Coach – Para Rowing
Nicola Benavente: High Performance Coach – Para Rowing
Will Stockton: Coaching Assistant
Pat Dunleavy: Physiotherapist
Maurice Hayes: Resources Manager
Louise Kingsley: Director of Performance and Deputy Team Leader
Shelley Wyatt: Communications and Media

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Topping the medal table, Sunday saw four gold medals and a silver added to the four gold and bronze from Saturday. Highlights include a ‘clean sweep’ of golds across the men’s sweep boats, medals for all 10 Para rowing athletes, and gold for both the Women’s four and Women’s quad.

Louise Kingsley, Director of Performance at British Rowing said: “It’s been a great weekend and it’s promising to see us top the medal table once again. We are still learning and building through this season, but performances this weekend have put us in a good place as we look towards the Olympic and Paralympic Games later this year.”

Ollie Wynne-Griffith and Tom George were sublime in the Men’s pair (M2-) finishing the race to win their first championship title since they moved into the pair. “Obviously it’s nice.” Tom said: “It’s a good marker and a checking point. We talk about it all the time but the big one is the Olympics. It’s good to learn how to win and win in different ways and different conditions. Today was a good example of that. It’s amazing – we’re European Champions and that’s really cool.”

Credit: Benedict Tufnell / British Rowing

The Men’s four (M4-) of Oli Wilkes, David Ambler, Matt Aldridge and Freddie Davidson took the gold despite windy conditions on the lake. Freddie said: “We’ve done quite a lot of stuff in some windy conditions in training camp so I think that helped us, but it’s obviously a different beast in six-lane racing versus just doing pieces on our own. I think it took quite a lot of commitment through the middle of the race to get ourselves back into it and lead it and to build our rhythm from there. We said after our heat we didn’t just want to sit or be satisfied, so we had a real focus of just doing our own piece and to be happy with where we were. I think that helped us during the long race because we had quite a simple plan. Obviously there’s still a bit to improve but it worked well for us.”

David added: “Obviously we want to get the win so we’re happy with that, because we’ve only had a week and a half to turn around and improve after falling short in Varese. There’s now three weeks until the next race and we can work on quite a lot of things in that time. There’s a lot of positives to take away, but we know there are a lot of really good crews to come in and the Italians are always going to be a force to be reckoned with. We worked hard and focused after World Cup I, if anything, having a slightly disappointing second place at the World Cup galvanised us into getting our eyes on the prize, sometimes you need a kick up the backside to do it.”

Credit: Benedict Tufnell / British Rowing

Another dominant crew were Lauren Rowles and Gregg Stevenson in the PR2 Mixed double sculls (PR2 Mix2x), winning back to back European titles. Gregg said: “This is my first double medal. We won the Europeans last year so to come here and do it again is pretty special. This is a springboard now, we’ve worked hard over the winter and we know what we have to do.

Lauren dedicated the win to her partner and five week old baby, “Five weeks ago my partner Jude gave birth to our son and so today was for Noah and Jude – I was thinking about our little boy in the last 500m. I was getting emotional being away from him so I definitely did it for them. To be out here and to be able to execute this is amazing. And to have Gregg supporting me through that – he’s trusted me the whole way and trust is a key part of this partnership.”

Credit: Benedict Tufnell / British Rowing

Frankie Allen, Josh O’Brien, Giedre Rakauskaite, Ed Fuller and cox Erin Kennedy continued the unbeaten run in the PR3 Mixed coxed four (PR3 Mix4+), dominating the race and finishing thirteen seconds ahead of France. Ed said: “It was our first race in this combination and the first race of the Paralympic cycle, so this crew is constantly learning and this race was another step in this journey. We’re racing three times this year including the Paralympic Games, so we’re going to keep building, keep progressing, keep our noses to the grindstone and keep pushing on for the one race that matters at the start of September which is the Paralympics.”

Credit: Benedict Tufnell / British Rowing

Newcomer Josh, making his international debut, added: “European champion sounds pretty good. It’s very exciting going out there for my first final today. We executed the race plan really well and I’m just so pleased. We had a big block of winter training at Caversham in pretty tough conditions, and we went out there today and executed our race plan brilliantly. It’s great.”

It was a solid silver for the Women’s eight (W8+) of Heidi Long, Rowan McKellar, Holly Dunford, Eve Stewart, Lauren Irwin, Emily Ford, Hattie Taylor, Annie Campbell-Orde, and cox Henry Fieldman. Eve said: “The race was good, we got off to a really good start and a good rhythm. It was disappointing that we couldn’t hold off the Romanians, but we’re learning every race and moving on. We’re in front of Italy in this race who pipped us at the end of the last race, so we’re happy with what we’ve done but hungry for more.”

George Bourne continued to build his experience in the Men’s single sculls (M1x) final, placing sixth. Rebecca Edwards and Chloe Brew were fifth in the Women’s pair (W2-). Earlier in the day, the Women’s and Men’s double sculls (M2x and W2x) B finals saw Becky Wilde and Mathilda Hodgkins Byrne finish seventh and Seb Devereux and John Collins finish ninth respectively.

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