Day eight, the final day, at the 2025 World Rowing Championships, in Shanghai, China. The single scullers closed the week in glory, two fabulous A-finals putting everyone on the edges of their seats in the course of a nerve-racking half hour. The result was two new anthems being heard this week, and some startling conclusions to an interesting season.

2025 World Rowing Championships

Up first, the women, led by three women who raced at least two of the early season regattas, and all of whom have gone into the single for the first time internationally this season. Dane Frida Nielsen had two third places from Plovdiv and Lucerne, Britain’s Lauren Henry was unbeaten through Plovdiv, Varese and Lucerne, while Fiona Murtagh (Ireland) was runner-up to Henry at Plovdiv and Lucerne, getting within a few seconds at the last event. Henry has speed and attack weapons but Murtagh was getting closer. Would Shanghai see the tables turned?

The answer was yes, after a race in which Murtagh went out so masterfully hard that the gap was clear water within the first two minutes and then extended to nearly two. Henry had to get through Nielsen, who had a quick start, and once she did, set about her usual task of carving up Murtagh. But the Irishwoman was having none of it this time: she had decided to give Henry no chance of applying her phenomenal mid-race attack power, and simply countered every single move with another hardening on, another turning of the screw which had Henry looking round again and again to judge the distance.

Two seconds apart on the water, the two best women’s single scullers in the world today battered one another up most of the course, but with Murtagh constantly bashing back at Henry. Eventually in the closing fifteen seconds the Briton played the rate card, hoisting it from the 40 she had already held for two hundred metres, to 44 and then 46. The gap narrowed dramatically, but so did the gap to the line. With Nielsen clear-water back and the rest, including Lithuanian Viktorija Senkute even further back, the world had narrowed to two scullers fighting it out.

The last three strokes saw the leaders’ bow-balls bobbing backwards and forwards with the catches, first one and then — very briefly — the other ahead. Finally they scorched across the line for a photofinish, but Henry was already hanging her head, she knew who had won. Gold to Murtagh by 0.03 seconds, less than a sharp intake of breath. A phenomenal race, and with one more stroke it could have gone the other way.

“Obviously I’m really pleased to come away with a silver medal but it is definitely disappointing,” said Henry. “I was quite honest when I said I was coming here for the gold and to miss out by less than a centimetre is pretty crushing. But all credit to Fiona, she’s a fantastic sculler, and I’m going to use this over the winter, hopefully come back better and stronger. It’s been a very long season for me, well over a year since I started training, so I’m committed to doing the hard yards over the winter and coming back faster next year.”

“I’ve been planning for that my entire life,” said Murtagh. “I’ve never been so confident in myself in my entire life, like all my thoughts have been so clear all week. I’ve been doing a lot of journaling and positive reinforcement all week. I’ve got a team who are so inspiring and so motivating that they instilled a belief in me way before I started to believe in myself.”

The men’s singles was a different kettle of fish, the industrious Simon van Dorp (Netherlands) the most recently garlanded of the top scullers this year after winning Varese along with a difficult M1x selection against team-mate Melvin Twellaar. The summer events had lacked Germany’s Olli Zeidler, who turned up in Shanghai in marvellous form despite fitting training round long hours of MBA study all year, and after just 8 weeks full-time training. Meanwhile Tokyo champion Stefanos Ntouskos (Greece) managed a great European silver in Plovdiv behind Yauheni Zalaty (AIN) but had then dwindled into the B-final in Lucerne. Zalaty himself, second in Paris, had taken the Europeans title, swerved Varese and finished behind a surprisingly fast Logan Ullrich (NZL) in Lucerne. But by the time Shanghai began Ullrich was back in the second ranks and it was these four scullers expected to fight it out.

Such fields invite fly-and-die, and it was Lithuanian Giedrius Bieliauskas who tried that, staying up with Zeidler and rapid starter Ntouskos to the first marker before fading along with surprise finalist Bruno Cetraro Berriolo from Uruguay. Zeidler leaned on his blades and shifted into a very solid rhythm but Ntouskos, who does love both heat and tailwinds, was up close to him, and van Dorp was following. Near the back of the field Zalaty had a poor start and was trying to trudge back.

The third quarter was battle stations, Ntouskos keeping Zeidler under relentless pressure and van Dorp getting closer to both of them. With a minute to go they were virtually level, then the Greek bow shifted ahead, rapidly followed by van Dorp. Now it was Zeidler on the back foot and having to react to others’ moves. Up went the rates, nearer came Zalaty’s bowball as he picked off Bieliauskas. Ntousko took it to 40, Zeidler responded, and the two of them flashed away from van Dorp as Zalaty started his own sprint. Zeidler hoicked it another two pips, but Ntouskos could smell victory, and bolted the last few strokes to claim a magnificent gold reminiscent of his victory in Japan five years earlier. Half a second difference, Zalaty third and a despondent van Dorp clear water back.

“When I saw the tailwind, I said to myself ‘oh, it’s your time’,” said Ntouskos. “It was very good, all the race plan, everything. I saw that these people cannot live with me for a long time.” World gold had been a long time coming, from his start at the under-23s eleven years ago. The key was his reaction to Zeidler’s sprint, never giving in. “I always think to myself, ‘you have a medal, you have a medal’, and I keep pushing. When I saw I was in front, I said ‘no, this is your moment. Push everything, you have the gold’.

“It’s very difficult with an Olympic gold medal round your neck to repeat it,” said his coach, Gianni Postiglione. “Stefano made something exceptional in Tokyo. Now it’s even more difficult to repeat something exceptional. To be a great sculler at this stage of life and to repeat it is very difficult.” “I think after eight weeks of training you can expect a lot less than I do here so I’m happy,” said Zeidler. “I only had time for one hour training [a day] until June.”

Van Dorp was pulled to the podium not for a medal, but to collect a Fair Play award, and generously talked to the press despite a disappointing afternoon. “At least it’s pretty close to my record, my best is around 6-39 and this was 6-40,” he said. “I came back from altitude really strong, I felt like I was going to be better than before, but let’s face it these guys are better than they have ever been.”

“Heartbreaking as this is, this is the race I want to be in. Because it’s so tough, because you can be as good as you’ve ever been and still get fourth like today. This is a real gladiator fight. Anything else is cool but I feel like if you want to be the best, this is where you prove it. Congratulations to all the other guys.”

Ireland and Romania Claim First Mixed Golds

Rounding off the day and the championships were the mixed doubles and eights, a new venture for World Rowing which amped up the atmosphere and sent it into party mode after the winner-takes all vibe of the single sculls races.

Athletically it was a huge success, the Irish 2x and Romanian 8+ cementing their reputations but not having to take it all too seriously. In the smaller boat the trick seemed to be partnering a man and a woman with similar enough rowing styles and reach, which may explain why lightweight Fintan McCarthy and openweight Margaret Cremen claimed the gold for Ireland with a feisty and exuberant row. Their nearest challengers were the Dutch, Roos de Jong and Melvin Twellar mismatched in size but not in determination: both got through Switzerland who had led for the first two minutes, and the Dutch closed Ireland’s open-water advantage down along the grandstands in a desperate but ultimately hopeless dash.

“All our pieces were quick so I think we came into the day confident,” said McCarthy. “I kept saying that to Mags in the race, and then she kind of pulled me across the line at the end.” “Just knowing Fin the last couple of years that he’s such a racer and will never give, you know I’d be similar,” said McCremen. “I was really looking forward to getting into the boat and feeling that never give in attitude. I really enjoyed it, I’m so glad we did it.” And would they defend the title next year? “Hopefully yes, let’s see how it works out,” said McCarthy. “But I can’t miss a gold medal at the world champs.”

“I think it’s a really fun end of the tournament, it gives more of a team feeling and it’s really fund to prepare for,” said Dutchwoman de Jong. “You have 48 hours to get everything together. But it was hot in the morning and we were ‘oh god, what did we sign up for?’” Things didn’t go perfectly for her and Twellaar, their heat race proving to be a bit of a mismatch of strokes. “This morning we were maybe both doing a bit of our own technique,” said Twellaar. “We needed to find something that worked for us both. So we had a talk after the [first] race about what we should do different, and then tried it in the warm-up and it worked really well. I was really happy we found out how to race together.”

The mixed eights was a triumphant ride for Romania, stroked by Simona Radis backed up by a powerful men’s engine room, and never gave anyone else a chance to challenge them. Italy held second place the whole way with a front-wheel drive format led by men in stern four, and New Zealand picked up the bronze.

“It was very very speedy,” said a breathless Maria Lehaci afterwards, who raced the eights in the Romanian two-seat a couple of places behind her (also stroke side) husband Florin. “When I heard Victorija (Petreanu, their cox) how speedy we are, I couldn’t believe. 1:23, 1:22 (for the first 500). It was amazing, very short race, but a tough one. Right now all it matters for me is that it’s over and it’s so good.” And particularly special celebrating with her partner. “I couldn’t have wished for that a few months or a few weeks ago. It’s my special medal from the worlds because it’s together.”

The experiment was a success, and it seemed that even crews who didn’t win, enjoyed it. The week duly wrapped up with the most disorganised Chinese party in history, in the centre of the Shanghai harbour at a splendid hotel, with medal ceremonies and more dancing and nobody quite sure what would happen next.

Rowing has been one of the slowest sports to embrace mixed events at the Olympics, and although World Rowing has finally taken the leap in 2025, it is too late for it to be included at the 2028 LA Games. More data is needed on whether it attracts streaming audiences, more crews and athletes in the next few years for the IOC to take it seriously, but it does feel like a fun way to end the week for crews consisting of racers and spares already entered in the regatta.

The fifth set piece of the day had been the PR3 mixed doubles A-final, won in triumphant fashion by Kathrin Marchand and Valentin Luz, who set a world best time in the tail-cross which had blown up by the time the medal races arrived. They were never seriously attacked after reaching their race rhythm, but behind them Britain faded to fourth and Ukraine and Australia capitalised to claim silver and bronze.

Earlier on a cracking men’s singles B-final saw Mihai Chiruta surviving a combined assault from Bastian Secher (DEN), Logan Ullrich (NZL) and Lorenz Lindorfer (AUT) to pull away in the last half-minute and claim 7^th place overall. The women’s B-final was a simpler win for Katie Clark (CAN) over Paige Badenhorst (RSA) and the mixed doubles B-final was no contest, USA all the way.

So that’s it, xiè xiè to Shanghai and China, on to Amsterdam next year. It will be worth the wait.

2025 World Rowing Championships