Cris Nievarez fought through but came up short of making the semifinal A/B after his fifth-place finish in the quarterfinal of the men’s singles sculls of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics Rowing regatta at the Sea Forest Waterway, Sunday.
After a strong start, the Quezon native slowly saw the other rowers paced by none other than the 2019 world champion Oliver Zeidler of Germany.
The German pulled through to the end with a time of 7:12.75 to book his place in the medal semifinals, joined by Brazil’s Luca Verthein Ferrera and Lithuania’s Mindaugas Griskonis.
Nievarez was just six seconds behind Griskonis and just two seconds off New Zealand’s Jordan Parry at the 500-meter mark, but the latter two widened the gap in the next few checkpoints.
The Filpino Olympic debutant tried to catch up to the pack, only the rest of the pack was too far beyond to overcome.
Nievarez looks to still make his Olympic count as he goes into the classification races beginning with the semifinal C/D which is scheduled on Tuesday, July 27.
