Rowing 4

Press, 9 November 1983, Page 54

Rowing 4

The New Zealand coxed four arrived in Duisburg without an international ranking or Sports Foundation backing — and left a fortnight later as a world rowing champion. The crew of Conrad Robertson, Greg Johnston, Keith Trask, and Les O’Connell, with a 16-year-old Hauraki Plains schoolboy, Brett Hollister, as coxswain, had not gone too well during its training period in New Zealand.

But as a racing crew it could hardly have performed better. Sceptics who said the crew was not a very good one had to start eating their words when the four recorded a world-class 6min 18s for the 2000 m in a time trial at Lake Karapiro. Then, in the words of the bow man, O’Connell, “we hit the course at Duisburg, and everything fell into place.” The four won the toughest of the three heats in 6min 32.45, beating the defending world champion, East Germany, Russia and West Germany. Already the coach, Brian Hawthorne, was starting to talk in terms of a gold medal. A few days later the crew

won again in the semifinals, this time recording 6min 9.245. Then came the final, and the four impressed not only with its win in 6min 13.895, but with the ease of victory. With 750 m to go New Zealand was in front and never looked like being beaten. In a high-class field the margin of one length and a quarter was called “nearly unbelievable” by Mr Hawthorne. East Germany and Russia, the winners of all the coxed fours titles for the previous 10 years, had to be content with the minor medals. It was the first time since 1968, when the so-called “spare parts” crew upstaged the eight at the Mexico city Olympics, that New Zealand had won a gold medal in the coxed fours.