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Men's Champ Single

By Aidan Buchanan and Will DiBattista
Posted on October 20, 2024
Men's Champ Single

(Photo by Chloe Craft)

No One More Surprised than Winner

Even the winner was stunned.

“I’m honestly in shock,” said Finn Hamill, the New Zealand rower who won the Men’s Singles Final on Saturday in a field that featured three Olympic medalists.

It was a dramatic race full of more twists and turns than Hamill is used to, although the final results tell a slightly different story: Hamill enjoyed a 21-second margin of victory over runner-up Javier Garcia Ordonez of Spain. He may have started 16th, but according to the clock, he never trailed, leading at every checkpoint. His efforts won not only a Head of the Charles medal, but the $10,000 first-place check as well.

Even with this commanding victory, Hamill couldn’t believe that he had won. “I actually got told while rowing back up, on the warm-down, someone yelled out ‘you won,’ and I had to ask them ‘are you joking?’ because I kind of didn’t believe it.”

The usual nature of the staggered finishes made the journey simple for Hamill. “Just rowing my hardest, he said, “knew I must have done OK since I passed people.” Without the ability to keep tabs on opponents, the Head of the Charles is as much a mental test as it is a physical one, demanding nonstop effort and consistency from the few lucky enough to claim a medal.

In claiming victory from Bow #16, Hamill became the first rower to win from such a distant starting position since 2018, when Ben Davison charged all the way to the winner’s circle from Bow #26.

Hamill has his sights set on his own Olympic berth in Los Angeles in 2028, looking to become the second man in family to row in the Olympic Games. His father rowed in Atlanta. “He rowed the lightweight double back in ‘96, and I rowed the lightweight last year. It’d be pretty cool if I could row the same event.”

The Charles adds some difficulty for the rowers with its turns, so Hamill had to be doing as much studying as he did training. “[Cambridge Boat Club member] Dan Schley sent me a document with all the notes and turns, and I managed a few runs this week on the course to lock it in.”

 

 

By Aidan Buchanan and Will DiBattista
Posted on October 20, 2024