Shaun Keeling and Lawrence Brittain won South Africa’s third silver medal of the 2016 Olympics, producing a superb last 500m in the Mens Pairs to overhaul Italy and Britain at the Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas on Thursday.
The race was won by New Zealand’s Hamish Bond and Eric Murray, a 71s consecutive win for them, with Italy claiming the bronze.
It was a very well controlled race from Keeling and Brittain and put the icing on the cake of one the great days for South African rowing. All four semi-finalists qualified for their respective finals in a wonderful hour of rowing.
Keeling and Brittain, rowing in Lane 1 established a good rhythm early, though they slipped to fourth at the halfway mark. By that stage Murray and Bond had complete control in first place, but the race for second was a dramatic one.
Italy and Britain were swapping silver and bronze between them heading into the last 500m, but it was at that stage when Keeling and Brittain found another gear. The hauled in the British and Italian boats, and passed them with 250m to go, ultimately claiming the second spot by two seconds ahead of the Italians.
Earlier the other four boats South Africa entered for the Olympic regatta all qualified for finals, with the Mens Four probably the biggest surprise. David Hunt, Jonty Smith, Vince Breet and Jake Green needed to come through the repechage on Wednesday to claim the final spot in the semi-final, but having given themselves that chance, they took it with aplomb.
They never fell out of the top four, in a race dominated by the Australians. But with the USA fading, South Africa took advantage of a sluggish finish from Italy and claimed a stunning second place in the semifinal. They will race in the Olympic final at 4.24 pm (Central Africa Time) on Friday.
Lee-Anne Persse and Kate Christowitz started the day for South Africa in outstanding fashion finishing third behind the USA and defending Womens Pairs champions Helen Glover and Heather Stanning.
There will be big hopes of medals from the two Lightweight Double Sculls crews. Kirsten McCann and Ursula Grobler produced a superbly controlled race and took advantage of an error from China in the last 500m to win their semifinal.
They will certainly fancy their chances of claiming a medal in the final, which starts at 3.32 pm (CAT).
James Thompson and John Smith - who were part of the awesome foursome that won gold in London four years ago - will go into Friday’s final as the favourites in the Mens Lightweight Double Sculls after they produced the fastest time in the semi-final.
It was superbly efficient stuff from the South Africans, who refused to be put off by a fast start by Norway. As it was, the Norwegians paid the price for that start, as they faded over the last 500m. Thompson and Smith, upped the ante in that period, and won comfortably. The final will be at 3.44pm (CAT) on Friday.
All in all it was a great day for South African rowing and showed that rather than rest on their laurels after that amazing gold medal for Smith, Thompson, Sizwe Ndlovu and Matthew Brittain four years ago, they’ve built on it and created one of the strongest programmes in South African sport.
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