Gibbs wins Olympic Trials

In only his second season as part of the GB Rowing Senior Team, Rory Gibbs today won the final set of trials before the Tokyo Olympic Games in four months.

Gibbs, partnered by Matt Rossiter who he won bronze with at last year’s World Rowing Championships, rowed through the field to take the win ahead of a strong field of World and Olympic medallists all attempting to stake their claim for seats in the Olympic Team. Twelve pairs were entered into the trials, which consisted of a time trial on Friday evening, followed by today’s semi-finals and finals.

Of these twelve, there were six Brookes athletes racing- more athletes than BROOKES|Rowing has ever fielded in a men’s pairs Olympic Trials. This is testament to the success of the Olympic Pathway programme that was launched in September 2018.

Rory Gibbs started rowing at Brookes in 2012, having been introduced to the sport at Millfield School. Under the eye of coach Henry Bailhache-Webb, he rose through the ranks and won his first GB vest in 2015. The following year he took his first Henley win in the Temple Challenge Cup, before adding two Ladies’ Plate wins and a Stewards Challenge Cup win in 2019 as part of the Great Britain M4-.

Oliver Wilkes, partnered by James Rudkin, finished in sixth place in the A final. Wilkes recently attended his first GB senior training camp and was part of last year’s Ladies Plate winning crew. Also part of that crew, Sam Nunn and Michael Glover raced to a sixth place finish in the B Final, where Rio 2016 Spare Matthew Tarrant finished 5th.

Morgan Bolding, who finished 12th at the World Rowing Championships last year with his partner Tom Jeffrey, won the B final in the fastest time of the day.

Jamie Copus, who will be hoping to qualify the LM2x for this summer’s Olympic Games, raced as part of the heavyweight men’s single sculls. He finished in 5th place in the B final in a stacked field of Senior and U23 medallists.

The athletes will take part in further testing in the coming weeks to decide crews and combinations to move into the final remaining World Cup ahead of this summer’s Games.