By Paul Daugherty
Enquirer staff writer

St. Xavier's Pat Todd (far left) and the U.S. lightweight fours team finished sixth in its semifinal Thursday. (AP photo)

ATHENS - Two local rowers dropped from medal contention Thursday in their semifinal rounds. Wyoming High grad Greg Ruckman and his partner, Steve Tucker, finished fourth out of six teams in their double sculls semifinal. Pat Todd, from St. Xavier, was on the men's lightweight fours team that finished sixth in its semifinal.

Only the top three teams in each semifinal advance to the medal final. Both teams now will row in consolation rounds - Ruckman on Saturday and Todd on Sunday.

Ruckman and Tucker started slowly and never caught up. They were in last place after the first 500 meters of the 2,000-meter race. The pair finished fast but missed a spot in the medal final by just less than 4 seconds. Their time was 6:21.46, 6.5 seconds behind the winning team from Poland and 3 seconds behind third-place Denmark.

"I didn't feel like we were out of it at 500 meters in," Tucker said. "We needed to be creeping back into the field during the middle 1,000 meters. We were working hard to make up a little ground, so when it came to the end, we didn't have enough" to catch the Danes and reach the medal final.

The lightweight fours never seriously contended for a place in the medals final.

Their time of 6:01.84 was more than 4 seconds behind third-place Canada.

"We tried to have a stronger start," Todd said. "I think we were in the hunt a little more in the early part of the race."

But they were never better than fifth place.

University of Cincinnati graduate Kelly Salchow will compete for a medal Sunday in the women's quadruple sculls final. Kings High grad Bryan Volpenhein will compete in Sunday's men's eight final.

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