Oli Welch (left) and Ben Taylor celebrate their title in the Men’s Pair at the World Cup rowing regatta at Seville, Spain.
Photo: Supplied/ Rowing New Zealand
World rowing champions Ben Taylor and Oli Welch have enjoyed another stellar day in their career, with the New Zealanders convincingly winning the men’s pair gold medal at the World Cup regatta in Spain.
The New Zealanders started strongly, leading by 1.63 seconds at the halfway stage, ahead of arch rivals Romania. They almost doubled the lead at the 1500 metre mark, and even though the Romanians made slight inroads in the last 200m, Taylor and Welch still crossed the line almost three seconds ahead, in a time of 6 minutes 26.86s.
The result was a good one for the Kiwis, with Taylor saying things haven’t gone to plan the last fortnight.
“The rhythm hasn’t really been there,” he said.
“We’ve been struggling to find our way a little bit, we hadn’t found that feeling we had back home in New Zealand.”
“I think just trying to simplify our rowing a bit and simplify the mindset brought us together,” he said.
New Zealand also claimed bronze on finals day, through Alana Sherman, Isla Blake, Kate Haines and Ella Cossill, in the women’s coxless four.
Despite finishing behind the Netherlands and Australia in the final, the result was big for Haines and Cossill, who claimed their first ever World Cup medals.
“I’ve been waiting almost seven years to get a medal,” said Haines. “The first thing Ella and I said to each other after the race was, ‘Oh my God, we finally got a medal!’
”We were really trying to soak it up together and remember how far we’ve come. You work so hard for these moments, so you need to make the most of them,” she said.
In other results, the men’s four (Fred Vavasour, Campbell Crouch, Harry Fitzpatrick and Josh Vodanovich) and the women’s quad (Olivia Hay, Stella Clayton-Greene, Beckie Leigh and Veronica Wall) both finished sixth in their finals.
The entire squad now heads to a training camp in Italy, before heading to the second World Cup event in Bulgaria in two weeks.
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