August 8th was a day of great pride for the whole club as Quinn Mosley (stroke) and double partner Alfie Webb (bow) of Leander Club secured the silver medal for Great Britain by taking second place in the A final of the Men’s 2x at the 2026 World Rowing Under-19 Championships staged on the 6-lane course in Plovdiv, Bulgaria over 4 days between August 6th and 9th.
Entering the most popular event of the Championships meant the odds were stacked against them with 33 crews contesting the first round heats on Thursday hoping to qualify for quarter finals the same afternoon – heat being the operative word with temperatures soaring into the mid-30s. Finishing second to New Zealand in 6.25.93 secured the required top 3 place to go into the second of the quarter finals which they won in 6.33.41 to qualify for a centre-lane position in Friday’s semi-final.
In their semi-final Quinn and Alfie again finished second, 0.8 seconds behind Marko Kosmac and Svit Kobler of Slovenia, and 1.9 seconds ahead of the Estonian double, giving them a place in Saturday’s A final.
Saturday was the first day of finals, with the Men’s 2x set to start at 09.19 BST, a thrilling affair in which the lead changed hands several times during a closely contested race, the GB pair overhauling Turkey and the Individual Neutral Athletes only to be pipped on the finish line by Endrik Hansen and Kubja Raimon of Estonia who took victory by 0.6 seconds. A brilliant performance from Quinn and Alfie saw them take the silver medal in 6.19.23.
The livestream recording of Saturday racing is here.
A round by round results summary for the Men’s 2x is available here.
Results of all races at the Championships can be found on the World Rowing website here.
Quinn is coached in Durham by Martin Tyler, about whom Quinn spoke to British Rowing before the competition, “My coach Martin has coached me from being a J15 until now. I’ve done a lot of work with him, and we’ve had a lot of success, which is nice. I’ve really enjoyed it.”
“I’m very proud of being from the North East. There’s not a lot of people from the North in the team, and it’s nice to be one of them representing Great Britain. Durham is a great community club, with a lot of good people. It’s very supportive, and I feel very proud to represent that club and getting here is nice for them too.”
A fantastic achievement by the two 17-year olds helped the GB team to 4th place in the medal table with silver in the Men’s 2x added to silvers in Men’s 4- and Women’s 4-, gold in Men’s 8+ and bronze in Women’s 8+ for a total of 6 medals at the Championships. The medal table is here.
Before the final day of competition on Sunday it was announced by World Rowing that Plovdiv will host a combined Under19 and Under-23 Championships in 2027.
Congratulations to all the athletes, coaches and supporters.
Photo: Benedict Tufnell