Sacrifice, perseverance and dedication. It’s 8am on a Good Friday morning and they’re ready to train. First the physical part, warming up and everything ready to get the boats out of the shed. There are boats of one, two, four and eight athletes.
He Selected Argentine will be made up of 14 boats who will try to secure their place for the Pan American Games in Santiago de Chile in the Pre Pan American which will also take place in the Andean country between April 15 and 19.
Following that tournament, the members of the junior selection will compete in the South American, which they won in the 2022 edition after four years in which Chile and Uruguay predominated.
The national technical director since 2020 is Pablo Susini and the youth technical director is Pancho Pfaab, who competed in Barcelona ’92 and Atlanta ’96.
Rowing has a very rich history in Argentine Olympic sport as it has four medals: one gold, two silver and one bronze. The most remembered was the gold that Tranquilo Capozzo and Eduardo Guerrero won in Helsinki 1952 in double pair without a coxswain, but not only because of the color, but because it was the last national gold medal for 52 years until Argentina was crowned again in Athens 2004 in soccer and basketball.
In the last Pan American Games in Lima 2019, the Argentine Rowing Team won four golds, two silvers and three bronzes. According to Susani, the team is in a moment of transition in which there are still very talented athletes from the old generation, but there are also new ones who need time to work to reach the highest level. “We have a very heterogeneous team, athletes with a long history who are Pan American champions and a part that is renewal. After qualifying we will regroup so that we can function in the best way and have a good Pan American”, assured the coach.
The rowing preparation is very physical, the athletes make permanent strength but at the same time they look for speed. Summer training starts at 7 in the morning and is divided into the water and the gym. “We do double-shift work, the morning one is longer than the afternoon one, sometimes there are two rowing shifts and sometimes the gym and rowing alternate,” said the national technical director.
Susini also explained the situation of sport in reference to a before and after the pandemic: “For many years Argentina had a very good team with Olympic finalists, a number of Pan American champions and a very large investment. A foreign coach was brought in who added a lot at that time and as the situation in the country worsened, the investment was less but it is a reflection of how we are and I hope it improves as soon as possible”.
The National Rowing and Canoeing Track It is in Tigre on the Camino de los remeros, it consists of a modern part that was built in 2011 for the Pre-Olympic that took place on the way to London 2012. It is ideal for its extension and exclusivity but the conditions of the Reconquista River channel are far from being suitable for high performance athletes.. Susini referred to this historical problem: “We continue to claim, the association always works to find a solution. There is a boat that cleans the track every day but Tigre receives all the waste from the suburbs and it is very difficult like that. It is cleaned but the contamination remainsIt is a deep job that is never done”.
Regarding resources, the focus should be on the recovery of the 1 percent tax on mobile telephony that was no longer allocated to sports in 2018. Although the national sports budget has increased, the current inflationary context means that it is far from what is necessary, especially if one takes into account that all equipment costs for most sports are in dollars.
How to get to Paris 2024?
The Olympic rowing cycle began in Asunción 2022 where Argentina was in third place in the medal table after achieving 8 medals: 1 gold, 5 silver and 2 bronze, behind Uruguay and Chile. It will continue in the Pan American Games after qualifying in the aforementioned Pre-Pan American and will culminate in Paris 2024. But how to get to the highest sporting event? In the case of this sport, the form of classification is in the World Cup or in the continental Pre-Olympic with headquarters to be defined where the Argentine team will have the best chances.