RIO DE JANEIRO -- Amanda Polk of Bloomfield and the U.S. women's eight put up the fastest time in the Olympic rowing qualifying heats Monday morning on Rodrigo de Freitas lake and, thus, advanced to the final race Saturday.
Their time of 6:06.34, begun by a powerful initial push, was more than three seconds faster than the only other nation to advance, second-place Great Britain, at 6:09.52. The other six countries must now go through a repechage to determine the remaining finalists.
The U.S. women have won 10 consecutive international titles in the eight, rowing's marquee race. But Polk credited togetherness above talent for the winning time.
"It was great,” Polk said. “It was our first full race together, and we definitely were right in rhythm with each other. We just had a lot of fun. It was a good first step to set us up for the final.”
Polk had "all my yinzers" watching from the stands at Lagoa Stadium, as she put it, a scene captured nicely by Gordon Loesch of our news partner WPXI-TV:
U-S-A! U-S-A!
Check out frenzy as family of Pgh's Amanda Polk cheer on W8 rowing team at #Rio2016 #wpxi @arpolk pic.twitter.com/nIWEemOzv6
— Gordon Loesch (@WPXIGordon) August 8, 2016