The 2025 World Rowing Indoor Championships, presented by Concept2, reached its climax with two weekends of finals on February 15th & 16th, and February 22nd & 23rd, and was contested as a wholly virtual competion with competitors taking part online from venues around the world.
There was a bronze medal success for Roger Stainforth, who was Durham ARC’s only entrant, and was competing in the 80+ age category in the Men’s 2000 metre event which was staged on the second of the two weekends.
All entrants were required to have recorded and submitted a qualifying time by February 3rd with places available for the fastest 150 in each continent and category, plus a further 10 places available for each age group category not already qualified.
The two weekends of finals consisted of Continental Elimination Heats on Saturday followed by semi-finals and finals on Sunday, the first weekend being for 500 metre sprints and endurance relays, and the second weekend for 2000 metre individual races and sprint relays over 500 metres. In each case the fastest 50 in the elimination heats progressed to the semi-finals and the rest were eliminated.
Following his success at the 2024 British Rowing Indoor Championships in December Roger was one of six entries for the 80+ 2k with a time ranked 233rd on the list of qualifiers. Opposition came from Denmark, Finland, Norway and the USA.
Around 1600 competitors in Men’s Women’s, Lightweight and Para categories took part over the two weekends. Eliminators were scheduled in 3 different time zones on Saturday – Asia & Oceania starting at 7.00 Central European Time (6am GMT), Europe & Africa at 11.00 CET, and the Americas at 16.00 CET. Semi-finals followed by finals went ahead from 16.00 on Sunday, meaning those who reached finals had to race three times over the weekend.
Entry lists, results, news reports and videos of the final stages are available on the World Rowing competition page here.
Elimination heat times for the Men’s 80+ were –
- Bent Bogh Pedersen (Denmark) 7.35.1
- Michael McGuirk (USA) 7.43.2
- Roger Stainforth (Great Britain) 7.43.6
- John Disterdick (USA) 8.05.7
- Johannes Vaakanainen (Finland) 8.18.8
- Olaf Ellefsen (Norway) did not start
Results have been compiled by Time Team. A complete list of times set in the Elimination Heats can be found here
With only 50 going forward to day 2 all the entrants in the age group were eliminated, and positions were determined according to times set in the elimination heats, which meant Roger securing 3rd place and a bronze medal.
Photo: AllMarkOne