#Rowing: Eliza O’Reilly and Gill McGirr took fourth in their semi-final, just missing out on an A Final place at the World Junior Championships this morning. The junior pairs race featured an extraordinary performance by Maria Kyridou and Christina Bourmpou of Greece. They set a new best time for the World Junior Championships of seven minutes 15.53 seconds – racing virtually entirely on their own, well clear of the five other crews. The contest for second and third, and qualification for the top six, saw France and Canada swap places through the middle of the race. McGirr and O’Reilly moved with purpose after half way and gained on these two. They fell short by 3.27 seconds of catching Canada, who took third.
The Ireland junior men’s coxed four finished sixth in their A/B semi-final. The crew of Conor Mulready, James O’Donovan, Fintan O’Driscoll, Eoin Gaffney and cox Eoin Finnegan were in touch at 500 metres, but by half way had dropped back to sixth and did not look in serious contention for a top-three place from there. Italy, Australia and the Czech Republic took the A Final places.
The Ireland junior men’s coxed four and women’s pair will compete in B Finals, while the junior men’s quadruple and junior women’s double – both of which won their C/D semi-finals – will race in C Finals.
World Junior Championships, Racice, Czech Republic (Irish interest)
Men
Junior Four, coxed – A/B Semi-Final: 1 Italy 6:23.40, 2 Australia 6:25.34, 3 Czech Republic 6:26.32; 6 Ireland (C Mulready, J O’Donovan, F O’Driscoll, E Gaffney; cox: E Finnegan) 6:34.84.
Junior Quadruple – C/D Semi-Final: 1 Ireland (L Hayes Nally, A Byrne, J Dorney, J Keating) 6:12.77, 2 Lithuania 6:16.01, 3 Norway 6:19.17.
Women
Junior Pair – A/B Semi-Final: 1 Greece 7:15.53, France 7:29.98, 23 Canada 7:31.25; 4 Ireland (G McGirr, E O’Reilly) 7:34.52
Junior Double – C/D Semi-Final (First Three to C Final, rest to D Final): 1 Ireland (C Moynihan, C Browne) 7:42.52, 2 Croatia 7:48.16, 3 Serbia 7:50.41.
