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Due to my hectic training schedule and with finals coming up I haven't been able to update the site for ages..plus there is the news that Matthew and James will be going into the coxless four, which kind of makes my URL less relevant, never mind!
Best wishes to a newly married James..it's Matthew's turn for wedding bells next week!
6 minutes, 14.27 seconds - at the world championships in Seville on September 21st, the GB coxless pair smashed the old pairs record by 4 seconds - and managed a convincing win agains their Australian rivals, who beat them in the Munich leg of the world cup in August.
The GB pair led from the start and although their was quite a fight for the lower medal positions, Matthew and James rowed clear for a fantastic race in the fast river conditions. Well done!
EVEN Matthew Pinsent, Britain’s triple Olympic gold medal-winner, admitted that the Duisburg Regatta had been hard work — “more tiring than the World Cup”, he said.
Nevertheless, Pinsent and James Cracknell, his coxless pairs partner, together with 18 other British crews, came home with medals. They had a clear-water win over Yugoslavia, the 2001 world silver medal-winners, on Saturday and, without Yugoslavia yesterday, the British pair dominated after halfway over Germany.
The core of the British world champion coxless four on Saturday found themselves racing for the gold, yet again, with the Germany 2001 silver medal crew. As in 2001, the British trailed early on but kept their heads, and went past the Germans with 150 metres to go. Yesterday, after the British clipped a buoy at the start, they had to sprint again, but missed gold by one-hundredth of a second.
Frances Houghton, Britain’s women’s single, pushed Ekaterina Karsten, from Belarus, the double Olympic champion, to within a length on Saturday. In the absence of Karsten yesterday, Houghton took gold.
Courtesy of The Times
Matthew Pinsent helped the coxless four to victory as British crews enjoyed another successful day at the Cologne Regatta. The three-time Olympic gold medallist was delighted to beat a competitive field which included a strong, fast Danish crew. He said: "I felt much happier with that performance - we have moved on since yesterday." Fellow Sydney Olympian James Cracknell was part of Pinsent's crew and was equally satisfied with the five second win. "I was really pleased with the way we rowed that first 500m." Cracknell said. "The most important thing this regatta has shown is that there are more people in Britain now of a gold medal standard to compete and train with." The crew of Pinsent, Cracknell and two of Britain's 2001 world champion coxless four, Steve Williams and Toby Garbett, got of to a good start. They held level with the Danes to the 500m mark before pulling away and maintaining their lead. Britain won four of the five races entered, missing out only in the eight to a Danish lightweight crew. The British single and double scull and the coxless pair all won emphatically.
Courtesy of BBC Online. Also see The Times and The independent
STRENGTH in depth was the theme of the final trials for the Great Britain summer event crews in Hazewinkel, Belgium, yesterday. The medal positions have been contested right the way down the course and that shows we are taking some serious steps foward, David Tanner, the international manager, said. Tanner was particularly pleased with the standard of the men’s and women’s heavyweight scullers and the lightweights.
Even Matthew Pinsent and James Cracknell, the world and Olympic champions, had to work hard to win the heavyweight men’s pairs, pushed hard to the line by Steve Williams and Toby Garbett, from last summer’s British world champion coxless four. Pinsent and Cracknell took charge early and then experimented with resting a little in the middle stages, but Pinsent, a triple Olympic champion, admitted: 'I was tired at the end, but I am happy with the result. We were very much in control.'
Yesterday’s final of six pairs included three other Olympic champions, Steve Trapmore, Luka Grubor and Kieran West. Rick Dunn, another member of the 2001 world champion four and this year’s Cambridge stroke, took third placewith Josh West, his Cambridge colleague.
Matt Wells and Alison Mowbray, Britain’s Olympic single scullers, were both beaten yesterday. Wells was kept in second place by Ian Lawson, from Britain’s 2001 double scull, while Mowbray finished third behind the precocious youngsters, Frances Houghton and Debbie Flood.
Flood followed her usual tactics of going for an early lead over Houghton. She got it but, from 1,000 metres, Houghton who has been training and studying in Spain this winter came through to win.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph
The traditional prelude to the boat race, The Head of the River is rowed from Mortlake to Putney (The opposite direction from the most famed university sporting event) and this year, 420 crews took part. Matthew and James took a 'break' from their usual international rowing training and lent a helping hand in their club's first VIII, Leander I. It paid off, as Leander retained the headship in a time of 17 minutes and 30 seconds.
Olympic gold medallist James Cracknell did not have the midas touch at the launch of the Sport Relief Row. The event, sponsored by PPP healthcare, pitted Cracknell against three Englishmen who excel at indoor rowing. Tony Larkham, Nik Fleming and Chris Rushton all won gold at the recent World Indoor Rowing Championship over 2000m and were invited to test Cracknell over the 500m sprint distance. And it was Larkham who proved to be the best man, knocking an exhausted Cracknell into second place after some ferocious action on the indoor rowing machine. The race officially launched the Sport Relief Row, which aims to raise money while also encouraging people of all ages to spend more time on the rowing machine. Also on hand to help launch the project was Cracknell's team-mate Matthew Pinsent and Claire Sweeney, who has just finished a long stint in the hit musical "Chicago".
The project will culminate on 13 July, which sees the PPP Healthcare Golden Mile. Individuals will have the chance to get sponsored and row a mile in their local gym or be part of a ten-man team rowing 100,000m. There will also be a Row The World initiative, with clubs across the country clocking up miles between 1 June and 13 July. All the money raised will go towards Sport Relief, a project which aims to help vulnerable children and young people in the UK and across the world.
Courtesy of BBC Online
James Cracknell and Matthew Pinsent opened their 2002 international account with three wins from four starts in Seville over the weekend.
In the FISA Team Cup events over 1,000 metres on Saturday, the world champions took the coxless pairs and also rowed in the winning eight. At the International Andalucia Regatta yesterday, in 500m sprints, they again took the pairs, but failed in the coxless fours.
Britain won the eights on both days but the scullers had mixed fortunes.
On Saturday, Frances Houghton, working in Seville and the only British woman competing, registered an impressive victory over world under-23 single sculls champion and world double sculls bronze medallist, Volha Berazniova, of Belarus. However, she could finish only fifth yesterday behind German world champion Katrin Rutschow-Stomporowski.
Ian Lawson won the men's single sculls on Saturday. Junior world champion Matthew Langridge, making his senior debut, was yesterday pipped on only the last three strokes by the experienced Belgium Bjorn Hendrickx.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph
Matthew Pinsent has been offered a seat on the International Olympic Committee's Athletes' Commission. The triple Olympic gold medallist only narrowly missed out on election prior to the Sydney Games in 2000.
"I am proud and delighted to have been invited to join the IOC Athletes' Commission," said Pinsent. "As I prepare for the Olympic Games, I will also have the opportunity to represent the thoughts of athletes from Great Britain and around the world."
Pinsent was handed the chance to take up a position on the committee following Jan Zelezny's vacation of the 19-strong body. The Englishman will now be presented for election to the IOC by their nominations commission, who meet in Salt Lake City prior to next year's Winter Games.
Courtesy of BBC Online
Matthew and James landed a 1 - 2 at the British indoor rowing Championships, held in Birmingham on the 18th of November. After a false start both James and Matthew matched each other's 1:19 second split time for the first 500 metres, pulling away from the rest of the competitors. After 500 metres, James held a slight lead. At 1100 metres, Matthew overtook for the first time, but James immediately took his rating up higher, and by 1200 metres he took a more comfortable lead. However, with a couple of 100 metres to go, Matthew took his rating up again and stole the race by a tenth of a second, coming home in 5:47.5.
James was recently awarded the degree of Master of the University, 'honoris causa' at Brunel University, where he had previously studied for his Msc in Sports science.
British rowing followed the Sydney successes with four gold medals and a bronze in the World Championships at Lucerne, which finished yesterday, including a unique double by James Cracknell and Matthew Pinsent.
The story might have been less happy but for the narrowest margin of 0.02sec by which Cracknell and Pinsent won the coxless pairs, having earlier taken the coxed title.
The earlier win had been relatively comfortable, with Britain, at a steady 34, clear by 1,500 metres. The Italians mounted a late challenge, but Pinsent was watching them and barely raised the rate in the final few strokes to hold the Italians.
Their cox, Neil Chugani, felt that this had not taken too much out of the pair but when, less than two hours later, the coxless boat was only third to Olympic finalists Yugoslavia after 500m, doubts began to creep in.
They had dropped to fourth by 1,000m, where they were over a length behind the leaders. They had overtaken Romania by 1,500m but looked to be too far behind the Yugoslavians. However, you can never write Pinsent off and when he mounted his final attack he was clearly closing on the Yugoslavians.
In a desperately close finish, with Pinsent at 43, it looked as though the British had just failed, but a photo showed that they had squeezed their bows in front on the very last stroke, to win in a photo-finish. Their relief, and that of the British supporters, when the result was announced was enormous - the Yugoslavians sagged, having thought they had won. Surprisingly, the Italians, who had harried them in earlier races, did not feature, finishing last.
It was a memorable victory and gave the British pair a unique double which Sir Steven Redgrave had failed to achieve on three occasions. Pinsent remains unbeaten in World Championships since 1991 and these two gold medals, the first without Redgrave in the boat, gave him his ninth world title, which equals Regrave's tally.
Courtesy of the Daily Telegraph
Matthew and James have had the perfect start for their bid to take both the coxed and coxless pair titles by finishing first in both their heats, taking them straight into the finals. Other GB results from the heats include:
Coach Jurgen Grobler and his rowers are confident they will not jeopardise their chances of success in the coxless event - in which they are unbeaten this season - by doubling up. "We've been thinking about doing both events all season, since Jurgen put it forward," Pinsent said. "We all liked the idea and wanted to do both. We're not worried about racing twice in a day if needed."
Britain will send 17 boats to Lucerne, three of which - the coxless pair and four and the eight - are World Cup champions.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph
Matthew Pinsent, the triple olympic gold medal winner has announced his engagement to Dee Koutsoukos, his Canadian girlfriend. Mr Pinsent, 30, who was awarded the CBE in the New Year's honours, won the third of his gold medals at the Olympic Games in Sydney last year. Miss Koutsoukos, 26, a management consultant, joined him at Buckingham Palace for the investiture and cheered him on in Sydney. He supported her when she ran the London Marathon in April.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph
The pair won the Silver Goblets & Nickall's Challenge cup at Hen;ey Royal Regatta on Sunday, by defeating a composite crew from AK and Leander rowing clubs in a time of 7 mins 40, with an 'easily' verdit. They also won the Prince Philip challenge cup, a coxed fours event where they teamed up with members of Oxford Brookes University.
The Camelot Group, PLC are sponsoring the GB coxless pair over four years in a 1.4 million deal to allow them to train full time leading up to Athens.
Matthew Pinsent and James Cracknell took gold in the coxless pairs in Vienna, but they had to take drastic action to secure the World Cup title.
In choppy conditions, they had to bale water out of the boat with a drinks bottle. The problem didn't prevent the Britons from roaring home over five seconds clear of Yugoslavia.
"We picked up enough water in the first three or four strokes to make the baling at the start pretty pointless," said Pinsent. "But at least we started with a dry boat. It was choppy but manageable."
The victory capped a series of fine British performances, which included four gold medals. Frances Houghton and Debbie Flood took the women's double scull, Cath Bishop and Katherine Grainger triumphed in the women's coxless pair, while the Olympic champion men's eight also took the title.
Britain won the Vienna Regatta title by an emphatic margin with a total of 57 points, 32 clear of Belarus, while they now stand 20 points ahead of Germany in the overall standings with just the final regatta in Munich to come later this month.
Courtesy of Ananova
The BBC are screening a follow up to the 'Gold Fever' Series with 'The Rowers Return' On Wednesday, June 27th at 10.35.
Olympic gold medallists Matthew Pinsent and James Cracknell added to their burgeoning trophy cabinet with victory at the World Cup regatta in Seville on a successful day for British rowers. Pinsent and Cracknell, competing in the coxless pairs, made it two out of two major internationals after their victory in the United States in April.
Rowing at fifty strokes a minute the pair - famed for their coxless fours exploits alongside Sir Steve Redgrave - established a clear lead early on and never looked like being caught by the international field. They crossed the line almost two seconds clear of Germany with the South African pair in third place. With sixteen points to their credit in the World Cup table they have only to make the final at the next event in Vienna to take the overall victory.
Britain ended the day with five medals - three silvers and a bronze to add to Pinsent and Cracknell's gold.
Frances Houghton and Debbie Flood took second in the women's double scull but there was disappointment for the men's eight. Based on the crew which won Olympic gold at Sydney, a rib injury sustained by Kieran West seriously hampered their chances and they finished in fourth place.
Courtesy of Sportinglife.com
Participate in the ultimate cross training challenge and you could be competing against our British Olympic heroes.
About the challenge:
The Rover Dream Team challenge calls upon sportsmen and women nationwide to participate in the UK's leading all - round fitness competition and test their strength and endurance against some of the fittest gym goers in Britain. In the ultimate test your team can reach the final to compete alongside the Rover Dream Team, made up of Britain's greatest Olympians including Audley Harrison, Jonathan Edwards, Darren Campbell, Dean Macey, James Cracknell, Jason Queally and Kelly Holmes.
How the Rover Dream Team challenge works:
There are two separate competitions - men (six per team) and women (4 per team). Compete in a gym relay, cross-country run, sprint shuttles and a swim relay along with the individual disciplines of rowing, the bleep test and power lifting. Qualify through regional heats and semi-finals to reach the final, where your team will be cometing for each member to win a fabulous holiday for two people.
How to Enter:
The interest for this year's event is hotting up, so enter your team before it's too late. Entry packs are available at gyms around the country now. Team entries to the regional heats will be on a first ccome first served basis, and entry costs £20 per person.
Regional heats take place in Leeds, Heston, Manchester, Edinburgh and Bristol in September. For further information, please call Jez or Hannah at In House Sports, 020 7239 1111
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph
Sir Steven Redgrave, the five-times Olympic gold medallist, was knighted by the Queen yesterday, and then reunited with his fellow Olympic rowers.
With him at the Buckingham Palace investiture were the oarsmen Matthew Pinsent, James Cracknell and Timothy Foster - the rest of the triumphant coxless four in Sydney - who were also receiving honours
Sir Steven, 39, from Marlow Bottom, Bucks, made history at the 2000 Sydney Olympics when he won his fifth consecutive gold medal after five Games. He also scored gold at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984, Seoul in 1988, Barcelona in 1992 and Atlanta in 1996.
James Cracknell, 28, who received the MBE for his part in winning the coxless fours with Sir Steven, said: "I feel a bit of a fraud when you see all these other people here receiving awards for helping others. But I have to admit today is special."
Matthew Pinsent, 30, from Henley-on-Thames, Redgrave's victorious companion for three Olympics, received a CBE and the remaining member of the coxless four, Timothy Foster, 31, from Bedford, an MBE.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph
Matthew Pinsent and James Cracknell have won gold in the coxless pairs at the Zurich Rowing World Cup. Matthew Wells also took bronze in the single sculls on a successful day for the Britons.
The British Olympic duo settled into their stride and opened up a 1.65 second gap over the Croatians by the halfway point. At 1,500m they had clear water ahead of the field and crossed the line in 6:50.75secs to win ahead of Canada with Croatia third.
The British pair scored the maximum eight World Cup points and head the rankings in the best-of-four event series.
"The switch [from stroke side] is difficult, especially in these conditions," said Cracknell afterwards. "It was frustration rather than elation coming over the line. There are things we wanted to do here and we did not really achieve them."
World Under-23 champion Matthew Wells rowed an excellent race to place third in the men's single sculls behind Olaf Tufte and 1996 Olympic champion Xeno Mueller of Switzerland.
The new lightweight men's coxless four combination of Matthew Beechey, Stephen Lee, Mike Hennessey and John Warnock placed fifth in their final to score three World Cup points.
Great Britain's total of 16 points earned sixth place in the overall World Cup regatta result.
Courtesy of Ananova
MATTHEW Pinsent and James Cracknell, who won gold in the coxless four at the Olympics in Sydney, began the long road towards the next Games in Athens yesterday when they were confirmed as the new coxless pair in the British men's team for this year's Zurich World Cup regattas. After winning high quality trials at Hazewinkel in Belgium recently, the first regatta - in Princeton from April 27-28 - will be the pair's first test against international opposition.
A large entry is not anticipated for this first World Cup meeting to be held outside Europe, but Pinsent expects the standard to be good.
At the team announcement at Leander Club in Henley yesterday, Pinsent described going back into a pair after four years in a four as "old book - new chapter". He hopes the new pair will dominate as did his old partnership with Steve Redgrave.
He admitted they were still on a learning curve - with Cracknell having to get used to changing to bow side - and they needed to get more consistent, but he was very happy with the trials and the training camp in Italy.
"It's a long way to Athens but it's exciting to be in a new boat to challenge for gold," said Pinsent.
The men's eight will not compete at Princeton because of an annual race with the French eight over 5,000 metres on the Seine on May 1, which is too soon after the Princeton regatta. The British eight are made up by the next four pairs after Cracknell and Pinsent in the trials. Ed Coode and Greg Searle, the pair who narrowly missed a medal in Sydney, are in the eight but the long-term plan is to put them into a coxless four, initially with world gold medallists Stephen Williams and Toby Garbett. These four fill the bow seats of the eight.
There is a possibility that the water on the Seine may be too high to allow the French race to take place, in which case members of the eight will compete at Essen on May 19-20, but possibly in small boats. There will be a strong British team at Essen. Outlining his plans for the coming season, Grobler said he was very pleased the way things were moving on after Sydney. The trials were very close and the squad were already nearly back to their best form.
Referring to the absence of Tim Foster, a member of the Olympic gold medal four, who missed the trials through a stiff knee, Grobler said he was back in a sculling boat and he has been told that his back will not prevent him from rowing through to the Athens Games. Grobler hopes Foster will be able to challenge for a place in a crew in time for the second World Cup regatta at Seville in mid-June.
A full team will also compete in the regatta in Vienna but, because of the proximity of Henley - which led to the fours' defeat at Lucerne last year - they will not compete in the final World Cup event in Munich.
Courtesy of The Daily telegraph, 19/4/01
James Cracknell and Matthew Pinsent, from the Olympic gold medal-winning coxless four in Sydney, dominated the British international trials at Hazewinkel yesterday, winning the final of the coxless pairs against an exceptionally strong field.
The fastest by seven seconds in Tuesday's time trials, they set the fastest time of three semi-finals and then went ahead early in the final, pulling out a length lead by 500 metres, where the Olympic finalists, Ed Coode and Greg Searle, were only fourth.
A great battle developed behind them - Coode and Searle, Luka Grubor and Louis Atrill, Stephen Williams and Tony Garbett - all world or Olympic gold medallists fighting for second.
So fierce was this contest that Cracknell and Pinsent could not get away and had to fight hard all the way to the line, with Williams and Garbett, the world coxed four champions, eventually coming home second, just under a length in arrears.
These were all top class pairs with only one of the twelve men in the final not a gold medallist, which could provide the nucleus of a strong team in the build up to the Athens Olympics.
Commenting on the winning pair's future, Pinsent said their aim was to win here and put themselves in the best position to be ion the top boat, whichever that was, in this year's world championships team, though no crews have yet been settled.
Chief coach Jurgen Grobler always keeps his cards close to his chest, but it will be a major surprise if he does not select Cracknell and Pinsent as the pair in the first of this year's world cup regattas at Princeton, due to be named a week today.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph, 12/4/01
James and Matthew were the winners of the coxless pairs time trial at the British Rowing's National Team Trials in Hazewinkel, Belgium. They were more than seven seconds faster than the second placed pair, Tom Stallard and Keiran West of Cambridge University boat club, with a time of 6:07.47.
Other results of the pairs trials:
SYDNEY coxless fours gold medallists Matthew Pinsent and James Cracknell, together with five of the winning Olympic eight, head the selection candidates for this year's World Cup and World Championships in the British international final trials at Hazewinkel, Belgium, today and tomorrow.
With 10 Olympic and 16 world gold medals between them, the open-weight squad, with the Athens Olympics as their long-term target, must be the strongest for any British trials.
Steve Trapmore, Kieran West, Luka Grubor, Louis Attrill and Simon Dennis from the winning eight, Greg Searle and his Sydney coxless pairs partner Ed Coode, together with three of last year's world champion coxed four - Richard Dunn, Toby Garbett and Stephen Williams - are competing in the coxless pairs.
Five of this year's winning Cambridge Boat Race crew are in the squad - Kieran West, Tom Stallard, Tom Edwards-Moss, Dunn and a surprise candidate, the 6ft 9in Josh West, who has always been considered an American but apparently has dual nationality.
Among the single scullers are Matthew Wells, Britain's Olympic representative, and Ian Weighell, a former quad sculls international and the only member of this year's Oxford crew in the trials.
Guin Batten, quad sculls silver medallist at Sydney and Britain's single sculler from 1994 to 1998, is trying for the single slot again, with Alison Mowbray, the single sculler at Sydney, in a double scull here with Lise Eyre from the Olympic eight.
Frances Houghton and Debbie Flood, the 1999 under-23 champions, who were surprisingly split for the Olympics, are back together here.
Another from the silver medal quad, Katherine Grainger, is pairing with world pairs silver medallist Cath Bishop.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph, 10/4/01
James Cracknell and Matthew Pinsent were part of the Leander 1 crew that came second in the Head of the River race on March 17th. They finished in 17 mins 30.98 seconds and subsequently won the Page trophy. The winners were Queens Tower 1, which contained most of the GB olympic eight.
Oxford held off a Leander crew containing Olympic gold medallists James Cracknell and Matthew Pinsent as their preparations continued for the Boat Race on Saturday week.
In a four minute piece on the Tideway, Oxford, on Surrey, had gained half a length after two minutes but were gradually pegged back and the crews were level when they stopped.
In a second piece, Oxford were a length up after 2 minutes when Leander, including world champion Tony Garbett, lost their fin and the row had to be aborted.
Courtesy of The Daily Telegraph
Matthew will be on 'Holiday' on BBC 1, 1st of April, 19.30
Senior National Trials, NWSC, 15 - 17 Apr
World Cup Regatta, Princeton, 9 - 12 May
World Cup Regatta, Hazewinkel, 13 - 16 June
World Cup Regatta, Lucerne, 10 - 14 July
World Cup Regatta, Munich, 2 - 4 Aug
Altitude Camp, 12 - 28 Aug
Pre-Worlds Camp, 31 Aug - 12 Sept
World Championships, Seville, 12 - 23 Sept
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