A New England native has struck gold in Paris!
Liam Corrigan, who is from Connecticut, helped his men’s four rowing team break a long gold medal drought at the Olympics Thursday morning. Watch the full replay here.
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This is the first time the U.S. men’s four rowing team — this one made up of Corrigan, Michael Grady, Nick Mead, and Justin Best — has won gold at the Olympics since 1960, and although the sport has grown since then, this gold medal is expected to give it a boost.
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Rowers practicing on the Charles River in Boston were thrilled by the news.
“I told some of my kids earlier today that the US had just won gold and they all got really excited and it kind of brought up the energy,” said Abby McLeod, coach at Community Rowing, Inc.
“I was really excited because I know that that boat class is a hard one for the US.”
Corrigan, a Harvard alum, rowed on the same river. He was among the winning quartet.
“I literally didn't quite believe that that was happening,” he said of the win.
Corrigan and his teammates completed Thursday’s men’s four rowing final, holding off New Zealand by less than a second to clinch gold.
“New Zealand had a good push maybe about 400 or 500 meters to go. I was a little concerned they would come through us. We held them off and then I think you know more or less held the margin from last 200 meters, which is great,” Corrigan said.
Ted Benford is the executive director at Community Rowing in Brighton, one of only three training centers for the National Team in the country.
“This is the reward for just their continued cohesion and their determination to perform at the highest most public level possible,” he said.
Benford has seen the highest level of athlete at his facility.
“We've had athletes training for Paris coming to CRI working locally in Boston training here with U.S. National coaches.”
And although Corrigan did not train at CRI, his connections to the region make him a figure to look up to in the rowing community.
“This might catch fire you know we're teaching 7,500 kids a year the sport of rowing,” Benford said. “Liam is a pretty good inspiration for kids if they wanna know a local guy who's been in the sport of wild and has achieved it at the highest level.”
There are still more medals to be won. Both men and women’s rowing pair, plus women’s double sculls finals, start early Friday morning.
