Only one of seven German rowing boats managed to qualify for Paris in the finals of the post-qualification round for the Olympic Games. On Tuesday, Julius Christ and Sönke Kruse (Leverkusen/Münster) made it to France by winning the coxless pairs on Lake Rotsee in Lucerne.
Four boats from the German Rowing Association (DKV) unfortunately failed in third place. Christ/Kruse are the first men’s pair to take part in the Olympics since London 2012. The duo won ahead of Lithuania, who also got their ticket. Christ and Kruse, who have been competing together since February and training in Dortmund, took the lead in the third 500 meters and didn’t let it go until the finish. This means that the DRV is represented in seven boat classes in France, as it was in Tokyo in 2021.
Since the Para-Mixed double scull PR2 (Jasmina Bier, Paul Umbach) in Switzerland also missed out on taking part in third place, there are still four German boats that will start at the Paralympics. The four without a coxswain (Frederik Breuer, Malte Großmann, Kaspar Virnekäs, Jasper Angl), the light double sculls (Paul Leerkamp, Jonathan Rommelmann) and the women’s double sculls (Frauke Hundeling, Sarah Wibberenz) also failed in third place. In the pair without a coxswain, Lena Sarassa and Hannah Reif came sixth, the women’s eight came fourth.