Swiss Women's Quadruple Sculls Wins Historic Gold

Nina Wettstein, Flavia Lötscher, Célia Dupré, and Lisa Lötscher not only won the gold medal, but they also secured Switzerland's first-ever women's medal in a large boat.

It marks the culmination—for now—of the Swiss men's quadruple sculls program. For years, the Swiss Rowing Federation has fielded a strong boat in this category—yet it has never been enough to win a medal.

The four Swiss women have made a huge leap forward since the Rotsee regatta a little over a month ago. At the Rotsee, the Swiss women finished only fourth—they were nearly five seconds behind third place at the time. Since then, the Swiss women have changed their lineup within the boat. They trained at full speed. And they pulled off a major upset in Varese.

Wettstein, Lötscher (twice), and Dupré won Switzerland’s only medal on Saturday. The biggest medal hope—the double sculls crew of Jonah Plock and Patrick Brunner—clearly fell short of their minimum goal, the bronze medal. The two Swiss rowers had already struggled in the preliminary round. They were unable to bounce back in the final. They held fourth place for the first 400 meters, trailing the leading boats by a modest margin, but then fell further and further behind. This sobering result may be due to their ongoing preparation. Plock and Brunner aim to be in top form for the World Championships in Amsterdam at the end of August.

Finishing fourth in the double sculls, Fabienne Schweizer and Salomé Ulrich also clearly missed out on the medals. Schweizer and Ulrich lost contact with the three fastest boats early on. Sofia Meakin and Olivia Roth didn’t stand a chance in the women’s double sculls and finished in 6th (and last) place. The fact that they were able to qualify for the final can be considered a success.

In the single sculls, Aurelia-Maxima Janzen and Kai Schätzle qualified for Sunday’s A finals. Both advanced as runners-up in their respective semifinals. The quadruple sculls, the only Swiss boat entered that did not reach the A final, finished second in the B final. Bojan Reuffurth, Donat Vonder Mühll, Raphaël Ahumada, and Maurin Lange were beaten only by Ukraine.