Hattie: The eights are looking great
Sunningdale rower says crew are in the perfect place to attack
Sunningdale rower Harriet Taylor believes Great Britain’s women’s eight are in the perfect place to attack this weekend’s European Rowing Championships in
Szeged, writes Abi Curran.
The 30-year-old won silver in the women’s eight at the most recent World Cup regatta in Varese, Italy, and also earned the same medal in the women’s four in an intense competition.
The Tokyo 2020 Olympian felt frustrated to miss out on gold in the eight to host nation Italy, falling short by less than a second, but they have a full focus on the same discipline in Hungary and hope to turn the tables.
Taylor said: “We’ve done a bit of doubling up to get our best experience of the racing.
“It’s always good to medal but it’s always disappointing when you want to win.
“It’s a relatively quick turnaround but actually, now we’ve got a bit of momentum and we’ve got a bit of fire in the belly from this race to try and attack Europeans.
“We did quite a lot of racing and the final was our fifth race of the weekend so we’re feeling pretty tired.
“Silver is still such a great result; we lost a little bit of momentum, but it’s really picked up again this year and I feel like we’re barrelling towards the Olympics.
“We’re really excited to see how it’s going and to see what goes on for the rest of the season.”
Taylor is joined in the eight crew by Holly Dunford, a former U23 women’s four world champion who made her senior debut in Varese.
After winning silver in the women’s four as well as the women’s eight with Taylor, Dunford is using her experience as a
building block for the European Championships, which take place between April 25-28.
Dunford said: “We’ve got the building blocks in place for an exciting summer, so we’ll keep building on that.
“Italy was good fun and a good experience to have two races and better experiences.
“We’ll probably have to have a chat as an eight and figure out areas of improvement and where
we can grow but it’s definitely a starting point.”
British Rowing is the governing body for the sport and is responsible for the development of rowing in England and the training and selection of rowers to represent Great Britain. The GB Rowing Team is supported by the National Lottery Sports Fund. To find out more, and to follow the team, head to https://britishrowing.org/