131st Royal Canadian Henley Regatta (Day 4) 09-Aug-2013 St. Catharine’s, Ontario BLISS WINS COVETED HENLEY GOLD IN FINAL OF LIGHTWEIGHT SINGLES ON DAY FOUR OF THE 131st ROYAL CANADIAN HENLEY REGATTA! Adam Bliss won Henley Gold in today’s Final of the Senior Lightweight Men’s Singles event at the 131st Royal Canadian Henley Regatta. This marks the first win at Henley for a Fredericton Rowing Club crew in almost a decade, the first ever Fredericton Rowing club single sculling victory, and only the fourth single from New Brunswick to win at the Royal Canadian Henley, the first three being Chris Flood in the Intermediate 155Lbs Men’s Singles in 1988, Todd Carson in the Senior 145Lbs Men’s Singles in 1998, and Stacey Norwood in the Senior Women’s Singles and the Singles Dash in 2005; all three represented the Kennebecasis Rowing Club of Rothesay, New Brunswick. Both Flood and Norwood went on to represent Canada at the World Championships and Pan American Games, a path that Bliss hopes to follow. All boats were bow to bow off the line and even at the 500m mark not one bow was decidedly in front. Bliss began the break from the pack in the second 500 metres of the race and was followed closely by Emanuel Borees of Brazil’s Botafogo Rowing Club and Edmonton Rowing Club’s Ole Tietz. The three bows remained within feet of each other with Bliss still leading and increasing his distance each stroke through the half way mark at the 1000m. In this third quarter of the race, Bliss pulled ahead of even these two, who kept in dogged pursuit, but couldn’t close the gap he opened up at this point. Sitting one length up on his two closest rivals, Bliss continued to move through the final 500m stretch as the rest of the field closed back in on his two would-be challengers. Bliss took the event, claiming Henley Gold in a time of 7:04.33, a full 4.06 seconds ahead of Riverside’s Michael Farry, who surged into second place with a time of (7:08.39), followed close behind by Valentin Sunsine of the University of British Columbia (7:09.80), Ole Tietz (7:10.44), Emanuel Borees (7:10.81), and Derek Stedman of the University of Western Ontario (7:16.43). “I came to Henley with high hopes,” said Bliss of his long trip across the country for this annual competition. “I accomplished my goals. I worked hard and it feels great!” Bliss’ coach and team mates back in New Brunswick were also pleased with the results. “We followed the race over a live cell phone video feed,” commented Alan Oldham, Rowing New Brunswick’s High Performance Coach. “The Canada Games athletes and I were cheering as he came by the three-quarter mark on the course where the camera was filming. Adam executed a brilliant race; it took real courage to put himself into such a strong position in the first half of the race. There is always the chance that you might run out of steam if you go out too hard, but this was the plan we discussed going into the final and nothing was going to stop Adam from crossing the line first. We are all very proud of Adam’s accomplishment and the Canada Games athletes are inspired to repeat his performances next week in Sherbrooke!” Full results are available online at the following address: henleyregatta.ca/en/2013-henley-results RACE RESULTS: RESULT EVENT -- TIME -- CREW -- ADVANCES TO TUESDAY: 1st Senior M Singles -- 7:09.45 -- Adam Bliss -- to Semi-Final (Wed) WEDNESDAY: 1st Senior Lightweight M Singles -- 7:07.60 -- Adam Bliss -- to Semi-Final (Thurs) 1st Senior M Singles -- 7:02.61 -- Adam Bliss -- to FINAL (Thurs) THURSDAY: 1st Senior Lightweight M Singles -- 7:38.34 -- Adam Bliss -- to FINAL (Fri) 2nd Senior M Singles -- 7:16.31 -- Adam Bliss -- SECOND PLACE FRIDAY: 1st Senior Lightweight M Singles -- 7:04.33 -- Adam Bliss -- HENLEY GOLD
Posted on: Fri, 09 Aug 2013 20:52:13 +0000
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