Skibbereen Rowing Club duo keen to compete at the 2020 Olympics
WORLD lightweight pair rowing champions Mark O’Donovan and Shane O’Driscoll have switched their focus to heavyweight rowing.
The Skibbereen Rowing Club duo feel the move to heavyweight offers them the best chance of competing at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.
Mark and Shane dominated the men’s lightweight pair – a non-Olympic class boat – this year, blitzing their way to World and European gold as well as winning gold at the three Rowing World Cup regattas, and now they have targeted the heavyweight pair (an Olympic boat) as their best chance to qualify for the 2020 Olympics.
‘We have to do this. We want to go to an Olympics and this is the best way of going,’ Shane told The Southern Star.
‘It’s a new chapter, similar to when we started out in the lightweight pair and every year we are going to build on it, up until Tokyo.
‘This is a bigger challenge than winning the lightweight world but we’re ready for it. Qualifying for the Olympics is our goal.’
For the full interview with Shane O’Driscoll see today’s Southern Star
