Trinity fights wind to gain Temple final

HENLEY-ON-THAMES, England - Trinity College mastered strong winds and rough water to take a 2-length victory over Stanford in the Temple Cup semifinals for students eights at the Henley Royal Regatta yesterday. The Connecticut crew will take on the University of Western Ontario, which beat Harvard by 3 1/4 lengths.

Trinity coxswain Flip Luisi told row2k.com that his squad had to be as "efficient as possible in the wind," which reached gusts of 30 miles per hour. "We were sure there was going to be bad strokes in the chop, we just had to recover from them and stay focused."

Southern California got out to a strong start and beat a Danish composite crew from Bagsvaerd Roklub and Danske Studenters Roklub by 1 1/2 lengths to advance to the final of the Grand Challenge Cup, the most prestigious race at the regatta.

The USC boat included six members of the Estonia national eight that failed to qualify for the Beijing Olympics.

USC will face a composite Canadian team from the Victoria City and Kingston rowing clubs that beat English club Leander.

US Olympic selections Wesley Piermarini and Elliot Hovey (California Rowing Club of Oakland) will face Peter and Thomas Graves (Bantam Boat Club of Cincinnati) in today's Double Sculls Challenge Cup final. Piermarini and Hovey advanced with an easy victory over Ross Hunter and Ian Lawson (Leander). The Graveses defeated Gabriel Winkler and Daniel Simkin (California Rowing Club).