Uru in focus at World Under-23 Rowing Championship

Uru in focus at World Under-23 Rowing Championships

New Zealand Lightweight Single Sculler Storm Uru will be under the spotlight this weekend as he aims for a rare hat trick of medals at the World Under-23 Rowing Championships in Strathclyde, Scotland.

Uru, who is from Invercargill but trains as part of the Lake Karapiro elite New Zealand Rowing squad, won bronze in the event in 2005 and last year took the gold medal with a World Best time for the 2,000 metre race. This season he has enjoyed successful races in Amsterdam and Lucerne in the senior Rowing World Cup series where he took two silver medals behind New Zealand’s top Lightweight Single Sculler Duncan Grant.

“Storm was a relative youngster when he took his first medal in the Under-23s and of course he is the current champion and World Best time holder, so all eyes will be on him in this particular event,” commented High Performance Manager Andrew Matheson.

“Emma Twigg in the Women’s Single Scull is likely to be a medal contender,” he added. “She raced at the 2005 Under-23 World Championships where she finished fourth before going on to the Junior World Championships where she won the gold medal. Clearly she is a very good prospect for this weekend and the future.”

Joseph Sullivan, who jumped into the elite Double Scull for the World Cup race in Amsterdam with Nathan Cohen so impressively, could also be in with an outside chance of a medal in the highly competitive Men’s Single Scull. According to Matheson, “This will obviously be dependant on who else turns up but given his performance in Amsterdam he will be going in with some confidence.”

New Zealand will also field a Women’s Quadruple Scull, a Heavyweight and Lightweight Women’s Double Scull and a Men’s Coxless Four. All could do well. “They could all spring a few surprises, but we will know more after the heats,” concluded Andrew Matheson.

Results and updates will appear on Rowing New Zealand’s web site at www.rowingnz.com

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