There was devastation for Putney Town Rowing Club’s Charlotte Taylor, who narrowly missed out on qualification for the semi finals of the lightweight women’s double sculls repechage this afternoon.
Only the top two teams would qualify and Team GB failed to fulfil their potential finishing third, behind their rivals USA and Japan.
Despite having defending Olympic champion Kat Copeland as her partner, the pair were unable to rediscover their 2015 form, when they won European Championship gold and World Championship silver.
The British pair started too slowly, finding themselves in last place after 500m, with the Japanese boat out in first place and over two lengths clear of the British boat.
Taylor and Copeland fought back bravely to reach third place by the half way point but despite chasing hard on a Japanese team there was simply too greater distance to make up
The US team looked relaxed and powerful, overtaking the Japanese boat to secure victory, but despite the Japanese tiring, Team GB still finished over five seconds behind with a time of 8:05:70.
