The fourth edition of the Malta indoor rowing championships was held recently for the first time at the Marsa sports club. The event was organised by Lakes fitness studio who set up and provided the latest Concept 2 model D indoor rowing machines.
Indoor rowing on the Concept 2 rowing machine is Europe’s fastest growing indoor sporting event with tens of thousands competing notably in the UK with over 3,000 entrants that race on one day.
The national races take place in winter all over Europe and that culminates in the European and world championships. Such is the prestige of the event abroad that the world famous Oxford and Cambridge rowing squads take part in the British indoor rowing championships along with members of national Olympic teams.
The sport attracts many professional and champion athletes from other sports as well and is considered a great alternative and cross training exercise for all. It is also interesting to note that the machine is used also in over 250 British schools to develop fitness and assist in fighting child obesity and this is something that the indoor rowing organisers in Malta are hoping to emulate on this island
This year’s entrants came as usual from a multitude of different local sports including tennis, squash, canoeing, rugby, swimming, golf, cycling, regatta rowing and track athletes. The age category ranges varied from under 10 to over 40 with the youngest competitor being six and the oldest being 60 making it an exceptionally versatile sport.
The under 10’s event began with a 500 metre race and this was won by Alexia Cassar aged 9 in 2 minutes 46 .8 seconds.
In the boys under 12 race Mark Pugslisevich came top for the second year running in the 1000 meter event with a new personal best time of 4 minutes 27.7 seconds.
The girls under 13, 1k event was won by Klara Sitova in 4 minutes 18.3seconds followed closely by Rebecca Hayes.
The Boys under 16 2k race was won by local junior golfer Chris Bergedahl in 7 minutes 12 seconds with James Dimech Malta’s under 15 junior cycle champion coming in second in a hard duel.
The Men’s over 40 was won by Tony Widler in 7 minutes 10.6 seconds and the Men’s lightweight event, contested among others by Matthew Asciak, the Maltese tennis champion and champion canoeist and former running champion Gerald DeGaetano. Matthew’s youth and extra weight eventually prevailed in a winning time of 7 minutes 15.2 seconds
The women’s open was tightly contested with several well known athletes taking part Last year’s runner up, Isabelle Zarb, came home first in 7 minutes 51.2 seconds just outside the Maltese women’s best time with Liz Said coming in a very creditable second.
The Men’s open has been annually a hotly contested race with athletes competing from various sports and from abroad.
For the third time in three years a national rugby player claimed the title, this time David Gasan winning by two seconds from Regatta rower Clayton Fiteni in 6 minutes 38.2 seconds. Adrian Nicholas came third in 6 minutes 51.0.
The event was held in aid of the Malta Muscular dystrophy group and the US Embassy in Malta supported the event by competing in several races and were very active and generous in their fund raising for the charity. In fact, the US Embassy put two teams in for the sliding machine team event that composed of two guys and two girls rowing over 16 minutes with two minute changeovers.
For the second year in a row team ‘Ken’ won the event with a combined number of metres of 8132.
USA 2 obtained a brave second place to close a successful day’s indoor rowing in a sport destined to become much bigger in Malta. The organisers thanked the US embassy for their support and the sponsors, MCE Ltd, Nestle, Multipower, Marsa Sports Club committee, and look forward to other events soon.