Johannesburg – Olympic gold medallists James Thompson and John Smith realised a life-long dream after claiming first place in the lightweight men’s double sculls at the World Rowing Championships in the Netherlands on Saturday in a new world’s best time.
The time of 6:05.36 they set was the best result in history at the global event by a South African crew, with Shaun Keeling and Vincent Breet also adding to the country’s successes by claiming the bronze medal in the men’s pair.
Thompson and Smith further etched their names in the annals of South African sports history as the country’s first world championships, only two years after they famously won gold at the London Olympic Games as members of the lightweight fours with Sizwe Ndlovu and Matt Brittain.
Brittain, who has since retired due to a persistent back injury, hailed the performance by his dear friends and former team-mates.
“It is the first time that South Africa got two medals at the world championships, we’ve got medals across different boat classes at a world cup but it is a big deal to have two crews in the medals at the world championships,” said Brittain, who watched the race from home.
“It was a very close race and you could see at all those points there was less than a second break in the field, when the race is so close and all you need is a small improvement to go through to a gold.
“When I watched that spectacular race it makes me just want to throw caution to the wind and just give it everything again.”
The South African duo was up against a quality field which included defending world champions Norway and pre-race favourites France.
The French crew of Jeremie Azou and Stany Delayre setting a New World Best Time on the opening day of racing at the Bosbaan improving the previous time of six minutes, 08.64 seconds (6:08.64) posted by Denmark in Amsterdam in 2007.
Going into the final the French crew have gone unbeaten throughout the season and were the outright favourites for the title.
The South African crew however, demonstrated the same tenacity they showed at the Olympics two years earlier.
With only a second separating the French crew from the rest of the boats, the South Africans remained in the hunt after they placed fifth after the first 500m mark before they moved steadily up the field.
In typical South African fashion Thompson and Smith opened up over the second half of the race and surged to a narrow victory to set a new benchmark.
Brittain said although they experienced an inconsistent season in the boat, the Thompson and Smith were not too far off the rest of the world.
“They’ve had a fairly disrupted season, and coming through this last six months they’ve really started to find the passion,” Brittain said.
“They had a really poor Lucerne (Rowing World Cup) race where they came 13th, but even in 13th place they were five seconds away from the lead which was about a one-and-a-half percent improvement they needed.
“The small improvement allowed them to jump a lot of positions.”
Keeling, who finished fifth in the final of the men’s pair at the 2008 Beijing Olympics with Ramon di Clemente, formed a successful partnership with Breet.
The duo started out strong for second place at the 500m mark before Olympic champions Eric Murray and Hamish Bond showed their class to claim the gold medal in a time of 6:09.340, with the Great Britain crew of James Foad and Matt Langridge taking silver in 6:13.75.
The South Africans held strong finish in close third posting a time of 6:16.85.
The women’s lightweight doubles sculls crew of Kirsten McCann and Ursula Grobler came close to a podium finish but had to be content with a fourth place.
The South African women’s pair of Lee-Ann Persse and Naydene Smith finished sixth in their final on Saturday, while the men’s coxed pair of Lawrence Brittain and David Hunt, with Willie Morgan as coxswain, were fifth in their final on Friday.
Brittain said the results boded well for rowing in the country as they target more silverware at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games.
“They are both Olympic-class events and then there was also the lightweight women that came fourth,” he said.
“To have five crews in A-finals which is the top six in the world and two medals is really impressive.
“For Shaun and Vince to come third is really impressive which shows the young guys are on the way up, Shaun is a bit more experienced but Vince is young.” – Sapa