Posted: 1 September, 2019

With Edinburgh’s Olympic silver medallist Karen Bennett and Glasgow’s Rowan McKellar in the engine room, the British women’s eight finished fifth in Sunday’s last race of the World Rowing Championships in Linz Ottensheim, Austria.

Although the crew was disappointed to finish out of the medals, they did beat Romania to grab the crucial fifth and last Olympic Qualification slot. Ahead of them New Zealand took gold, Australia took silver and the United States won bronze, with Canada in fourth place.

This result means that all seven Scottish Rowing members of the British team – silver medal lightweight single sculler Maddie Arlett from Selkirk, bronze medal coxless four stroke Sholto Carnegie, Edinburgh’s Melissa Wilson in quad sculls, Edinburgh’s Polly Swann in coxless fours, Angus Groom in quad sculls, as well as Bennett and McKellar – successfully played their part in qualifying British boats for the Tokyo Olympic Games.

Article by Mike Haggerty.