Day six at the 2025 World Rowing Championships, in Shanghai, China. The second day of medal-hunting in China began with a late start, by which time World Rowing had already issued a formal warning to all teams not to mess with the equipment rules. By the end of Friday the temperature had hit 33.5°C (94°F), there were eight new countries on the week’s medal table, and new reputations had emerged.

The morning edict emerged from concerns raised two days ago that [unidentified] teams were using special coatings or finishes to disrupt the surface tension of water around the shells or the boundary layer of water next to the hull. Which can make crews go faster through the water. These are not new tricks, they first emerged several decades ago and are often discussed, hence section 4 of Appendix R2 of the bye-laws to Rule 29 – Boats and Equipment. This simple gem has been around for ages and says: “No substances or structures (including riblets) capable of modifying the natural properties of water or of the boundary layer of the hull/water interface shall be used.”

World Rowing investigated, discovered evidence — but not enough proof to take action against any crew or athlete — so had their Equipment & Technology commission make sure the relevant boats were washed with soap and vinegar to remove anything on the natural hull surface. Further monitoring on this matter will continue.

2025 World Rowing Championships

After all that it was a joy to get back to simple clean racing, which on Friday was delivered at all levels, from the men’s singles D-final at noon to the men’s four medal race a couple of hours before sunset. The M1x D-final saw Estonia’s 2024 under-23 quads champion Mikhail Kushteyn romp through a former world and Olympic medallist, a heat winner here and another under-23 champion for a flourishing win on the Shanghai course in a quick time.

That was followed by a flutter of good races, from the three-way battle between Ireland, Hungary and Belgium for second and third in the M1x C-final to a close decision in the second W1x semi, a thrilling pair of M1x semis, and a confusing men’s fours B-final. And that was all before the medal races began.

The Olympic singles semis delivered at least as much as expected. For the women the familiar 2025 pattern continued, of Lauren Henry (GBR) dominating both her race and the times, but with Irishwoman Fiona Murtagh claiming the other semi only slightly slower. Henry, who had promised us improvements in her racing, is delaying her body opening up until very late in the leg-drive. Behind Henry the other two qualifiers were Frida Nielsen (DEN) and a revived Alexandra Foester (GER), the latter ahead of the USA’s Lauren O’Connor, whilst Viktorija Senkute (LTU) and Esther Zamorano (ESP) took the remaining spots behind Murtagh, shutting out Canada’s Katie Clark.

The Irishwoman is new to the single, though not to sculling, having raced the JW4x at what was then the junior world championships, in 2013. As Row360 reported a few weeks ago, she showed her solo inexperience capsizing in rough weather this summer at the Irish national championships, though she has shown no sign of a repeat here. While we’re debunking myths, although Foester is a baby compared with the 30-year-old Murtagh despite having already gone to the Olympics, she is only 23 days younger than Henry: neither of them turn 24 until later this coming winter. Both are shockingly composed and calm for their age.

The second men’s singles semi was a bunfight, Giedrius Bieliauskas (LTU) being rowed through by AIN star Yauheni Zalaty — as expected — but also by Bruno Cetraro Berriolo who became the first Uruguayan to reach the M1x final for nearly forty years and put paid to Kiwi Logan Ullrich’s hopes of another medal race. But the first semi had been a corker, reminding spectators that no race is over until the beep.

First half, absolutely standard. There’s usually someone trying it on off the start, and this time Austrian Lorenze Lindorfer briefly hit the spotlight, staying up with the leaders for the first 500 before the fast pace became too much for him. Then the usual suspect took over, in the shape of Germany’s world and Olympic champion Olli Zeidler hitting the front like a roadblock past which nobody had a hope of sneaking. For minute after minute he sat there clear water ahead of the rest, while Simon van Dorp (NED) sat not far behind him, and Greece’s Stefanos Ntouskos found his rhythm and crept up from fourth to third.

Day Six: 2025 World Rowing Championships in Pictures

A move from van Dorp, who never lets his opponents’ reputations get to him, was to be expected and it came in the third 500m shaped as a sneaky hardening of both rate and pressure, the rate itself putting pressure on the watching Zeidler. Since van Dorp gets plenty of distance per stroke the higher rate did him a lot of good, and over the course of several hundred metres he took back overlap on Zeidler and started to turn the screw. With the gap only a couple of metres Zeidler decided to react and pumped it a little, but van Dorp kept coming which forced Zeidler to toughen further despite his hope of cruising.

Eventually the German decided he definitely wanted the best lane and with under 200m to go began to give it his best, just as Ntouskos, who had been dogging their footsteps, rattled van Dorp with a sprint of his own. An unintentionally useful race for the Dutchman and Greek, whose shadow-boxing forced Zeidler out of his comfort zone after he must have thought he’d got it sewn up. If only those three were in Sunday’s final it would be an attention-grabber but throw in Zalaty, Berriolo and Bieliauskas and it’s a recipe for a thrilling battle to claim gold.

The question mark in the first half of the session came in the men’s fours B-final, won in the end by a determined Croatia hell-bent on proving their disastrous semi-final had been a mere error. During the early stages the US four, who are doubling up into their eight, sat in second and looked perfectly capable of challenging for the win. However immediately after passing the mid-race timing marker they dropped the rate down to the mid-20s and dawdled in last nearly a minute behind Croatia. There is no ‘best effort’ or ‘race it out’ rule in World Rowing, though there is at USRowing events, so the US M4- will have improved their chances in Saturday’s men’s eights by ditching their fours contest.

It’s unlikely anything similar was happening in the women’s fours A-final a short while later, even though it was a surprise to see both the Dutch and the British, first two to show at the front, dropping away after the halfway mark. Neither was giving up, however: instead the problem was the masterful rhythm and pace set by the USA, who had a brilliant second 500m to take over the lead.

The British and Dutch clung on for a while, but when Romania began to challenge it was too much for them, and when the Kiwis joined the party that was it, the gap to the back three began to widen and it was then just a case of whether or not the Americans could hold on against the Romanian sprint. The answer was a resounding yes, despite Romania closing to a canvas by the end. “We were able to stay internal and stay calm and pulled off some really great pushes from our competitors which definitely had us sweating there,” said Teal Cohen (USA).

Their counterparts, the new men’s fours champions, are an entirely fresh and perhaps experimental quartet from Britain, adding another chapter to the serious history GBR has in this event with an all-out speedfest which put the British on top of the half-time medal table. There is a superfluidity in the crew which gives them what appears to be effortless flow, but power is there too, and a natural cohesion which gives them lengths on their opposition. Clear water ahead at 1000 metres they fended off Romania’s assault on the lead with a smooth gear-change while the Dutch four, now containing erstwhile sculler Melvin Twellaar after a summer re-selection, held on after being passed by the Romanians and were well clear of Lithuania for bronze.

“We’ve only had six, eight weeks together [in this crew],” said James Robson. “We’ve just been trying to make sure we’re not slowing the boat down at any point in the drive or on the recovery. As we moved away a little bit in the third 500 I glanced over to my right and saw the Romanians coming, and I thought this is going to be a dogfight to the end. We needed everything we had today, but it was enough.” And for young rhythm king Douwe de Graaf, a debutant senior gold in the four to add to matching medals from the junior (2017-18) and under-23 (2022) worlds. If they can survive the return of year-off rowers to the British squad and stay as a quartet next year, this could be a combination to watch.

The PR1 women’s singles was the biggest of foregone conclusions, Ukraine’s Anna Sheremet all but crowned world champion within the first minute. It was particularly good to see South Korea and China increasing the para-rowing medal diversity with silver and gold after being locked in battle most of the way up the course. However the men’s race delivered both the predictable and the unexpected, with European and Olympic champion Ben Pritchard (GBR) claiming the next title on his list, but closely hounded all the way by Ukraine’s reigning world champion Roman Polianskyi who in turn was under continual pressure from the 45-year-old master Erik Horrie (AUS). Italy’s Giacomo Perini, who has lacked confidence this year, came in fourth some margin back.

“Erik definitely scared me this week, all I’ve been thinking about is whether I’d have what it takes,” said Pritchard afterwards. “But as soon as I did my push at 750m, I held onto it and saw [Horrie and Polianskyi] do a push. And I was like ‘you’re not coming towards me’. Then as soon as we entered the red buoys I heard Nicola (Benevente, the GBR para performance director) shouting at me and I was ‘I don’t have any tiers left, this is it, so I hope they don’t come back at me because I was struggling by then’.”

“I just want people to realise that age is only a number and never think you can’t enjoy a sport like this at the top level,” said Horrie. “Hopefully I can encourage more people to get into rowing and make our sport even better than it is now.”

After that gem came a fortissimo women’s double sculls final, home nation hopefuls China (Chen Yunxia and Zhang Ling) leading as confidently as they had done in the world cup until the Netherlands threw a spanner in their works called Roos de Jong. De Jong has been seeking a championship title for many years, frequently falling just short, most notably in Paris last year. Now teamed up with Benthe Boonstra she finally did it, the two of them pounding through the middle thousand metres of the race to challenge and finally pass the Chinese. For at least 250 metres they were side by side but after the final timing marker the Dutch bow owned it more consistently and as the AIN double closed on both leaders the rate went spiralling up from both China and the Netherlands, neither flinching.

Finally de Jong was up alongside the Chinese bow seconds before the line and the job was done. A gold medal waiting at the dock, finally. “I felt really confident after the warm-up,” she said afterwards. “It was super scary, it always goes through your head: what if it [losing] happened again? But this time I just felt angry and I think Benthe felt the same. It was like ‘no, we’re going to do it’. And it worked out.”

The men’s doubles, this year the refuge for former lightweights, went to a fully heavyweight crew, Poland’s Miroslaw Zietarski and Mateusz Biskup finally claiming what is unbelievably Poland’s first ever gold in the event. Surprising, given the nation’s intense pedigree in crew sculling, particularly the men’s quad. “We didn’t expect that we can win both the European and world championships, that’s an amazing story for us and we look forward to next season,” said Biskup. “At the 1500 I saw our lead that we have open water, so we knew that we have to only row what we were doing the last 300 metres.”

The Poles led throughout, the closest that anyone came being Switzerland and Ireland in the first minute. The Swiss unfortunately faded but Ireland got a recovering lightweight onto the podium, Finn McCarthy and new doubles partner Philip Doyle holding off Spain for bronze after being passed by Serbians Martin Mackovic and Nikolaj Pimenov who became Serbia’s first M2x medallists with silver.

The PR3 mixed doubles semis, in one of the event’s biggest ever fields, went as expected to Germany and Britain, with Australia closest to them both on time. Sadly the youngest competitors in the regatta, ultra-juniors Dinara Belyanina (16) and Akbarali Abduvaliev (15) from Uzbekistan, were relegated to the B-final coming fourth behind Germany, but they could win the B-race and do look like serious talents for the future.

With a change from the traditional programme the eights will close off Saturday’s racing alongside two Paralympic categories, whilst the singles and the new mixed non-para events will take their bows on Sunday.

2025 World Rowing Championships