Mahe Drysdale regained his national single sculls title in style today, setting a course record on the way to blitzing a world class field on Lake Ruataniwha near Twizel today.
Drysdale clocked six minutes 47 seconds to smash the record he set four years ago by 10sec, stretching out in the second half of the 2000m race to finish 5sec clear of arch-rival Rob Waddell.
Waddell, who beat Drysdale by three lengths in last year's final, was second ahead of lightweight Peter Taylor, Joseph Sullivan, Nathan Cohen and Storm Uru.
Cohen set a blistering pace in the first 500m to lead out Waddell, Drysdale and Taylor. As he faded heading towards halfway, Waddell assumed the lead with Drysdale half a length behind and stalking the 2000 Olympic champion. Drysdale drew level with Waddell with 900m to go and proved the stronger as he pulled away for a comfortable win.
He was pleased to have notched one of his most dominant displays on domestic water in recent years despite having taken a long break after taking a bronze medal at the Beijing Olympics.
"This is the start of the four-year (Olympics) cycle for me and I'm pleased to have such a positive start," Drysdale told Radio Sport.
After the hectic pace set by Cohen over the first 500m, the race had settled down to be a "bit more normal", Drysdale said.
"I found nice rhythm after 1000m, began to row a lot better and started to move away." Waddell's preparations for the regatta weren't ideal, having competed as a crew member for Team New Zealand in the Louis Vuitton Pacific Series off Auckland which finished last weekend.
In the women's single sculls, Auckland's Emma Twigg shed her bridesmaid's tag after finishing second the last two years to the now retired Caroline Evers-Swindell.
Twigg beat Waikato's Jaime Nielsen by almost nine seconds with Paula Twining, also of Waikato taking third.
Southern's Hamish Bond and Matthew Trott added the quadruple scull and straight four titles to their medal hauls today after earlier winning the pair and double sculls.
Central's Rebecca Scown and Fi Patterson took the pairs title and then teamed up with Anna Reymer and Harriet Austin to win the four and dethrone Auckland RPC. Central also took the win in the women's lightweight double scull event through Candice Hammond and Louise Ayling.
