Australian rowers lay down a challenge to Brits

Australian rowing threw down the gauntlet to their British rivals and revealed they have established a “day house” just outside the Olympic regatta venue at Eton Dorney Lake in southern England in order to cut travel times for athletes. Australian High Performance Director Andrew Matheson told reporters on Tuesday that the day house helps level the playing field for Australian athletes with their hosts who are staying nearby. The village for rowing athletes is up to an hour bus ride from the Dorney Lake Olympic regatta site and Matheson said the house would provide a handy halfway venue. [caption id=“attachment_390477” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Australia’s rowing team trains ahead of the Games. Reuters[/caption] “What we had a few months ago was some concerns about the infrastructure and transport issues,” Matheson said. “A lot of that has worked out pretty well, but we felt we needed to take the initiative and set some other options for the team.” Australian triple-gold medal winner Drew Ginn cranked up the heat on his British rivals in the men’s four with the prediction that defending champion Tom James and crew will have to row the race of their lives to keep up with an Australian crew that are not “scared to hurt ourselves”. “We are going to turn it into a drag race and if they are going to win gold, they are going to have to row like their lives depended on it,” he told reporters. “We’ve made it (the strategy) public purely for the fact it scares the hell out of them. And so we’ll keep doing that.” The Australians lost to Britain’s James, Alex Gregory, Pete Reed and Andrew Triggs Hodge by a second at the 2012 World Cup in Lucerne before winning in Munich three weeks later. The 37-year-old Ginn said those races were just a warm up for the Olympics where he is targeting his fourth gold medal as he lines up with Joshua Dunkley-Smith, James Chapman and Will Lockwood in the men’s four. “It was our way of making it known we are up for a fight”. British rowing has delivered at least one Olympic gold medal since 1984, largely through the exploits of now retired Steve Redgrave and Matthew Pinsent, and they are under pressure to deliver again on Dorney Lake in the first week of the Games. Looking to get the home nation off to a strong start and begin the climb up the medal table, the squad set themselves a target of six medals to match their feat in Beijing where they topped the rowing table comfortably ahead of Australia. Both Australia and Britain have won gold in the last five Olympics in the coxless four, Britain taking the last three, and both teams have made it a priority boat for the London Games. However, as well as the defeat of the flagship British men’s four, which has won gold in the last three Olympic Games, the British men’s eight will have to overcome a dominant German crew in the frantic sprint that always ensues. The lightweight men’s double scull, which claimed the second of Britain’s two gold medals at the 2008 Games, started the season well but lost by some distance in the last two international races of the season. Reuters