St. Catharines, ON - The best university rowers in Canada converged on the Port Dalhousie this weekend to compete in the 2022 Canadian University Rowing Championships.

Coming off the OUA Championships where the women's team retained their OUA title for the 9th straight year, they followed that up with a 2nd overall team finish at the national level. The Men's team had a strong showing as well finishing in 5th place in team standings.

The Mustangs saw four podium finishes in the event including a pair of gold medal performances from the Women's Lightweight 1x race and Karissa Riley, she finished in a time of 7:33.500. Riley was also in the Women's Lightweight 4+ boat that picked up a gold medal, that included Sara Butler, Hayley Conrad, Kaitlyn Hall & Enna Sue as the boat finished with a final time of 6:47.130.















Western's medal haul also included a silver medal in the Women's 2- race that was run by Rachel Weber & Elisa Bolinger. Bolinger also added a bronze medal in the Women's 1x race. 

  
"The Women's team performance was a huge leap forward from last season. We had legitimate medal hopes in every category, and it was great to finish with four out of six boats on the podium." said Mustangs Women's Head Coach Matthew Waddell "Ultimately we were just 0.8 seconds across two categories from finishing as national champions, which represents both a lot of progress and a tough loss."

The University of Victoria Vikes team captured the overall title on the women's side, while the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds took the title on the men's side.

"After a very positive OUA Championship we had a challenging CUs.  The level of competition is very high, and we continue to rebuild our program." said Mustang Men's Rowing Coach Dan Bechard "These are challenging but necessary steps to having a better future."

Other Mustangs team finishes:
Men's Lightweight 2x - 6th
Men's 2- - 5th
Women's 8+ - 4th
Men's Lightweight 4+ - 4th
Women's Lightweight 2x - 5th
Men's Lightweight 1x - 6th
Men's 8+ - 6th

Individual Major Awards
Women's Athlete of the Year – Alizée Brien (University of Montreal)
Men's Co-Athlete of the Year – Patrick Keane (University of Victoria) and Thomas Markewich & Stephen Harris (Brock University)
Women's Team Coach of the Year – Jane Gumley (University of Victoria)
Men's Team Coach of the Year – Mike Pearce (University of British Columbia)
Above and Beyond Athlete of the Year – Rhiannon Crichton and Vienna Scholten (University of Ottawa)
Coach Builder of the Year – Joe Rochon (Concordia University/ETS)
Peter Somerwil Award for Development of University Rowing – Peter Somerwil
 
Women's Final Point Standings
Victoria 106
Western 100
UBC 90
Queen's 82
Brock 58
Toronto 53
Ottawa 40
Trent 31
Calgary 29
Carleton 25
McGill 22
Montreal 21
StFX 20
Guelph 16
Saskatchewan 15
Dalhousie 13
McMaster 13
Fort Langley 1
Concordia 0
Nipissing 0
Ontario Tech 0
Alberta 0
Waterloo 0
ETS 0
 
Men's Final Point Standings
UBC 123
Brock 104
Victoria 101
Queen's 60
Western 58
McGill 50
Toronto 30
StFX 24
Guelph 22
Carleton 21
Calgary 18
Montreal 17
Waterloo 12
McMaster 11
Trent 9
Dalhousie 7
ETS 6
Fort Langley 5
Nipissing 5
Alberta 3
Ontario Tech 0
Ottawa 0
Saskatchewan 0