30th National Rowing Championships – The Forces lead the way in the quarters & semi – finals

One of the most looked forward to events in the rowing calendar, the 30th National Rowing Championship started early on Thursday morning at Diyawanna Oya, with enthusiastic rowers warming up on the banks of the lake, ready to show their endurance in the water. The races for the day consisted of the coxed fours and double sculls in the men’s and women’s category. 

Men’s Category
Teams from Army, Navy, Air Force, University of Colombo (UOC), University of Moratuwa (UOM), and Ananda College(AC) participated in the over 18 men’s fours category. All institutions except UOM had two teams participating in the race, which led to three quarter – finals (QF). The Navy A team consisting of TM Piumika, ESVJN Premakumara, SACS Kumara, AGW Priyadarshana and AMP Senarath moved on to the finals directly after beating the Army B team by a boat length in QF-2. In QF-1, the finish was very close; there was only a seconds difference between the Army A team which consisted of Nishan Lakmal, Chinthaka Kumara, Wijithawansa Pushphakumara, Mayura Dassanayake, and Prasad Pushpakumara, and the Air Force B-team, with the Soldiers coming out on top. The A team from the Air force had better timing than the UOC-A team and AC-B team.  The teams that finished the race first in the quarter finals will be moving directly to the finals and the teams that came in second in quarter finals will be meeting again in the semi-finals on the 26th of September.

The under 18 fours had two semi-finals (SF). Nalanda College –A, Ananda College – A, S. Thomas’ College – A and Royal College – B raced in SF1, where AC – A and RC-B came in first and second  putting STC-A in the third place and out of the game.  These two teams will meet RC-A and AIS-A, the winners of SF2, in the finals to be held on the last day. Unfortunately STC-B too lost its shot at the finals, failing qualify in SF2.

In the double scull event in the over 18 category, Army A from QF1, Air Force A from QF2 and Navy A from QF3 entered the finals, while the teams Navy B, Army B and Air Force B will be racing in the semi-finals. 

Women’s Category 

The women’s races consisted mainly of double scull events in the age groups under 18, over 18 and open. In the open race, ladies from the three forces raced against each other. The sailors proved their strength in the waters by moving faster than Army leaving more than two boat lengths between them. The Navy team balanced the double with WAU Subashini and SHDN Sandamali.

Again in the Over 18 category, the Navy team with WAN Damayanthi and GGTU Sumanathissa reached the finish line closely followed by the Army team. The team from Kothalawala Defence University, though they put in an effort to challenge the leaders, failed to match the energy expressed by the forces.

In the under 18 category consisting of school girls, three boats raced in two clusters. Thavisha Attanayake and Naveksha Gunasekara from Bishops College (BC) reached the finish right before Kavisha Dassanayake and Ashvini Subasinghe from (LC). The CRC team failed to make it to the next level in this group.

In the second group with the same teams, CRC held its third position while the first and second places were exchanged between LC and BC. LC-A team with Jeshani Srikumar and Nihara Waravita kept a lead of more than two boat lengths between them and the BC-B team of Shinnali De Mel and Eleesha Munasinghe.

All the final races will start on the 26th morning while the awarding of the championships in each category will close the nationals for the year.