Boats from 19 Nations Meet London 2012 Qualification Criteria

China’s Lou Xiaoxian and Fei Tianming have qualified for the London 2012 Paralympic Games by winning the finals of the Trunk and Arms Mixed Double Scull (TAMix2x) at the 2011 World Rowing Championships on Lake Bled, Slovenia with a time of 4:01.81.

They were closely followed by France’s Perle Boughe and Stephane Tardieu (4:02.98) who took silver and Australia’s John Maclean and Kathryn Ross (4:05.13) in bronze.

The first eight rowers made the qualifying time for the London 2012 Paralympic Games and also included Ukraine’s Dmytro Ivanov and Iryna Kyrychenko, Italy’s Daniele Stefanoni and Silvia de Maria and Great Britain’s Nicholas Beighton and Samantha Scowen, Israel and Poland.

In Sunday’s Legs, Trunk and Arms Mixed Coxed Four (LTAMix4+) finals, Great Britain was triumphant, winning gold with Pamela Relph, Naomi Riches,David Smith, James Roe, and Lily van den Broecke in a time of 3:27.10.

Canada’s Anthony Theriault, David Blair, Victoria Nolan, Meghan Montgomery, and Laura Comeau (3:31.84) won silver. They were closely followed by Germany’s Anke Molkenthin, Christiane Quirin, Martin Lossau, Michael Schulz and Katrin Splitt (3:33.27), who took bronze. Teams from France, Ireland, USA, China and Ukraine also qualified for the London 2012 Paralympic Games.

Other rowers meeting the London 2012 Paralympic Games qualifying criteria included:

Adaptive Women's Arms and Shoulders Single Scull (ASW1x)

Alla Lysenko (UKR)

Nathalie Benoit (FRA)

Moran Samuel (ISR)

Jongrey Lee (KOR)

Claudia Santos (BRA)

Liudmila Vauchouk (BLR)

Martyna Snopek (POL)

Filomena Franco (POR)

Adaptive Men's Arms and Shoulders Single Scull (ASM1x)

Tom Aggar (GBR)

Alexey Chuvashev (RUS)

Erik Horrie (AUS)

Ronald Harvey (USA)

Jun-Ha Park (KOR)

Edorta de Anta Lecouna (ESP)

Jie Yang (CHN)

Daniel McBride (NZL)

A total of 32 boats from 19 countries met the qualifying criteria for the Paralympic Games. Ukraine, France, China and next year's host country Great Britain qualified the most with three boats each.

The final Paralympic Qualification Regatta will be held in Belgrade, Serbia next May 2012 with a minimum of two boats in each of the four events earning spots for London.

Adaptive rowing at the Paralympic Games is contested in four events; men's and women's single, mixed double and mixed coxed four. It’ll be the second Paralympic Games where Adaptive Rowing is contested.