[fullmetal]

Your last paragraph is accurate but not sure it necessarily applies to Stanford this year. They had the Coxswain and stroke from last year's ncaa second place finishing 1v8 boat in the v4 plus last year's conference newcomer of the year with world championship experience. Maybe the less experience of the remaining two rowers was the difference but I thought the level of experience and skill (on paper at least) in the v4 was higher than usual.

It sounds like you're not convinced that Stanford put their best 16 rowers + 2 coxswains in the eights...?  I mean, maybe.  Once every few years, you'll notice some woebegone program who suddenly has a great V4+.  It's not hard to see what's going on there.  Couple things though: I cannot be certain that good athletes from one year are similarly great the next.  Could be covid, could be a harder course load, could be an early season injury that put them behind the curve, could be newer athletes developing faster and winning seat races.  It's not my impression that this program doesn't put their best athletes in the 1V8+, followed by the 2V8+, followed by the V4+.  Note that Pac-12 women's rowing newcomer of the year Iris Klok is right in the middle of the 1V8+ lineup.

Anyway, a second observation: the second 500m of the V4+ in the grand final was markedly slower than their third 500m.  This almost never happens--it's quite an anomalous race profile.  It's even less common than ties for the championship broken by varsity eight finish, imo.  My guess is that either there was a mental block, or maybe there was a technical error in bladework (a crab or something).  Stanford beat Princeton and Ohio State by large margins the day before and didn't beat them the next day, so assuming full effort from all three boats on both days, something happened to Stanford.

[fullmetal]

Your last paragraph is accurate but not sure it necessarily applies to Stanford this year. They had the Coxswain and stroke from last year's ncaa second place finishing 1v8 boat in the v4 plus last year's conference newcomer of the year with world championship experience. Maybe the less experience of the remaining two rowers was the difference but I thought the level of experience and skill (on paper at least) in the v4 was higher than usual.

It sounds like you're not convinced that Stanford put their best 16 rowers + 2 coxswains in the eights...?  I mean, maybe.  Once every few years, you'll notice some woebegone program who suddenly has a great V4+.  It's not hard to see what's going on there.  Couple things though: I cannot be certain that good athletes from one year are similarly great the next.  Could be covid, could be a harder course load, could be an early season injury that put them behind the curve, could be newer athletes developing faster and winning seat races.  It's not my impression that this program doesn't put their best athletes in the 1V8+, followed by the 2V8+, followed by the V4+.  Note that Pac-12 women's rowing newcomer of the year Iris Klok is right in the middle of the 1V8+ lineup.

Anyway, a second observation: the second 500m of the V4+ in the grand final was markedly slower than their third 500m.  This almost never happens--it's quite an anomalous race profile.  It's even less common than ties for the championship broken by varsity eight finish, imo.  My guess is that either there was a mental block, or maybe there was a technical error in bladework (a crab or something).  Stanford beat Princeton and Ohio State by large margins the day before and didn't beat them the next day, so assuming full effort from all three boats on both days, something happened to Stanford.