When the sport of rowing was coming out of the COVID 19 pandemic, athletes at the St. Catharines Rowing Club were allowed to choose one person to row with in a pod.

Giancarlo DiPompeo and Owen Kudreikis, teammates then in the SCRC’s under-17 program, decided they would work together in a double.

“We started rowing this combo near the end of COVID when things started opening back up,” said Kudreikis, a scholarship rower at the  University of Pennsylvania. “We knew we were pretty quick for a junior double back then so we came back three years later and rowing in the exact same combo on the same course is awesome.”

The band of two isn’t back together for any run-of-the-mill regatta. The duo has been selected to represent Canada in the under-23 lightweight double at the 2024 World Rowing Senior, Under 23, and Under 19 Championships (Mega Worlds) Aug. 18-25 in St. Catharines.

They enlisted the service of SCRC coach Mike Petrychanko to help them out but they knew it wasn’t going to be easy. With time trials set for early June in St. Catharines, DiPompeo, a scholarship rower at the University of Victoria, headed to Philadelphia in May to get some time in the double with Kudreikis. Kudreikis competed in the Intercollegiate Rowing Association championships on a Sunday, drove home Monday in time for one practice session that night and then competed in the trials with DiPompeo on Tuesday.

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