London 2012 Olympics: Double bronze for GB rowers takes medal tally to six

Published on 04/08/2012 02:15

BRITAIN’S women have won two golds at Eton Dorney and the rowing team’s overall medal tally has swollen to six after both Alan Campbell and the men’s pair of Will Satch and George Nash claimed bronze yesterday.

Nash, who took a year out of his engineering studies at Cambridge to compete at the Olympics, was paired with Satch at the start of the season after Pete Reed and Andrew Triggs Hodge were moved into the four. Reed and Hodge had failed over two years to beat the dominant New Zealand pair of Eric Murray and Hamish Bond, and the Kiwi crew roared to gold yesterday. This was only the third international regatta in which Nash and Satch had rowed 
together and they were within half a second of snatching silver from France.

“It’s been an awesome year,” said Satch. “George and I have come up through the ranks. He has a lot more pedigree than me but I’ve put a lot of work in and in the last six months it has come together. It was just awesome to be on that line. We are both quite ecstatic. I don’t know if we thought we could do it. I didn’t think I would be here six months ago.”

Campbell secured his bronze after virtually rowing himself to a standstill to finish behind Olympic champion Mahe Drysdale and Ondrej Synek. “I just couldn’t take another stroke at the end of the race. I could barely stand [in the medal ceremony]. I could not get my words out,” Campbell said. “There was a lot of emotion. To stand tall with two of the best guys in the world, you could not ask for more. It will be tough for any other day to match up to today.”

Stephen Rowbotham, Charles Cousins, Tom Solesbury and Matt Wells were in medal contention for much of the quadruple sculls final but had to settle for fifth. Despite missing a medal, they can be proud of their achievement in becoming the first British men’s quad to qualify for an Olympic final.

The crew only came together for the World Cup series and Wells, a bronze medallist from Beijing, said: “Given what’s happened this year, I think we’ve really outdone ourselves. I’m really proud of the guys in the boat with me. I think they’ve done an outstanding job, and when it came to it, not one of them bottled it, which can often happen with the pressure and the crowd. In fact, every one of them raised their game. Although I’m bitterly disappointed to have finished in fifth place, I feel really proud of what I’ve done.”