Rowing Coxless pair finish last in world champs

Press, 11 September 1989, Page 22

Rowing Coxless pair finish last in world champs

;.j Dieu, Yugoslavia The coxless pair Vikki Payne and Lynley Hannen, failed to reproduce their Olympic bronze medal winning form when they were beaten into last place in the world championships on Saturday.

The Waikato duo, who had represented New Zealand’s best medal hope after the surprise elimination of the single-sculler, Eric Verdonk, at the semi-final stage, struck a buoy at the 1000 m mark which cost them valuable seconds.

They were forced to stop rowing while Hannen replaced her seat which came off its runners.

Even without this misfortune it was unlikely that Payne and Hannen would have been able to close the gap which the powerful Europeans nations had opened up from the start. The gold medal went to East Germany with Romania taking the silver and West Germany the bronze. Payne and Hannen have been plagued by a series of accidents and illnesses which have seriously hampered their build-up to these championships.

First, Payne broke a rib when she fell off a bike and then both women contracted a virus which laid them up for several days. “Maybe if none of these things had happened we might have stood a better chance,” Payne said, adding that her rib injury still caused her breathing difficulties.

“Now we’ll never know how good we are.” Payne said that she felt they were in with a top-three finish until the buoy incident, despite the gap opened by East Germany, Romania and West Germany on the chasing pack.

"We had just started to mount our attack and I could see the field coming back to us,” she said.

Payne said it was the first time in international competition she had struck a buoy. "What a time for it to happen,” she added. Their coach, Mr Harry Mahon, said that he was disappointed but not surprised at Payne and Hannen’s failure to win a medal.

"Considering all the things that have gone wrong they did well just to reach the. final,” he said.