Greece’s Stefanos Ntouskos Wins Gold; Breaks Record in Rowing at Tokyo Olympics

Greek athlete Stefanos Ntouskos won the gold medal at men’s single sculls in rowing at the Tokyo Olympics.

Ntouskos had also competed at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, in the men’s lightweight coxless four, finishing in the sixth place.

Ntouskos pulled off a breathtaking Olympic stunner, setting a new record at the Games with his time of 6:40.45. Norway’s Kjetil Borch finished one second after Ntouskos to take the silver medal, and Croatia’s Martin Damir trailed Borch for the bronze.

Ntouskos pulled ahead during the third quarter of the race and sustained his pace for a glorious 250-meter-run that ended in his smashing of the Olympic men’s single sculls record.

Stefanos Ntoukos signals a new era for Greek, Olympic rowing

This is the 24-year-old competitive rower’s first medal at the Olympic Games and it is Greece’s first Olympic rowing gold medal, as well as it’s first medal of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

Despite Greece’s previous drought of Olympic rowing medals, a new generation of Greek talent are showing that Greece can become a dominating presence in the aquatic sport.

Just yesterday Greece’s female rowing duo Maria Kyridou and Christina Bourbou made history after breaking the world record in the semi-finals of the Women’s coxless pair category.

The Greek duo finished at 6:48.70, the fastest time in the world in this event.

The previous world record was 6:49.08, held by the New Zealand duo of Grace Prendergast and Kerri Gowler, who had competed in the final round of the Women’s Pair category at the Rowing World Cup II event that was held in Poznan, Poland in 2017.

However, during the second semi-finals on Wednesday, the world record that had just been achieved by the Greek athletes was broken yet again — this time by the team from New Zealand.

Despite this the team has clearly shown they are at the cutting edge of performance in their events. Kyridou and Bourbou placed 5th at the finals this morning, just missing the podium and losing out to their New Zealander rivals Prednergast and Gowler, who took home the gold.

Ntousko’s big win today comes after a trying week for Team Hellas after Greece’s artistic swimming team had to be placed in quarantine.

Greek artistic swimming team quarantined

The Greek artistic swimming team had to be quarantined in a hotel after traveling with an assistant who tested positive for COVID-19. The Hellenic Olympic Committee announced that the assistant, who had tested positive after arriving at the airport in Tokyo, is currently quarantined in a separate hotel from the artistic swimming team.

Evangelia Platanioti was the first member of the team to test positive. Platanioti, who received her result before ever arriving in Tokyo, has since dropped out of the games.

All of Platanioti’s other team members tested negative for the virus. While Platanioti has a mild case of the virus and there is little concern about her physical health, the athlete has lost her shot at a spot in the Olympics for which she has trained for so long, alongside her team members.

Despite the strict anti-virus measures in place at the Olympic Village in Tokyo, nearly 200 people have now tested positive for the coronavirus there since the Games began.