Canada qualifies three boats for 2016 Olympics

AIGUEBELETTE-LE-LAC, FRANCE— Three Canadian boats qualified for the 2016 Rio Olympics with strong performances Thursday at the world rowing championships.

The Victoria duo of Lindsay Jennerich and Patricia Obee raced to first place in their women’s lightweight double sculls semifinal, qualifying a Canadian boat for Rio and advancing to Saturday’s final.

The Canadians were in sixth at the halfway point of the race before surging ahead to finish first in a time of six minutes 57.02 seconds.

“Our race was perfectly executed,” Jennerich said. “At the 400-meter mark we slipped into a great rhythm, it felt really good. At that point, I knew we were going to move onto the final.”

Earlier, Toronto’s Jennifer Martins and Cristy Nurse of Georgetown, finished third in their semifinal in the women’s pair, qualifying for Satur- day’s final and earning Canada an Olympic berth.

“It’s a really satisfying feeling,” Nurse said. “The women’s team did not qualify a pair for London in 2012, so I think what we did today is a step in the right direction for our program.”

The men’s four of Will Crothers (Kingston, Ont.), Tim Schrijver (Thedford, Ont.), Kai Langerfeld (Parksville, B.C.) and Conlin McCabe (Brockville, Ont.) advanced to the medal round and earned Canada an Olympic berth with a third-place finish in their semi. “We had a good plan and we were executing it perfectly,” Crothers said. “We knew we had to raise our game in this race and that is what we did. When we caught a bad stroke, I stayed calm and made some calls to get us back together quickly. Schrijver also did a great job of recovering his oar quickly.”

The men’s four final goes Saturday.