LINZ-OTTENSHEIM, Austria – The Cal men's rowing team had four alums help qualify boats for the 2020 Summer Olympics at last week's World Rowing Championships.

Maarten Hurkmans, who graduated from Cal last spring and was the 2019 Pac-12 Men's Rowing Scholar-Athlete of the Year, helped The Netherlands capture the silver medal in the Eight and a spot in the Tokyo Games next summer. Julian Venonsky (2016 alum) coxed the U.S. Eight to a fifth-place finish, also securing a spot in the Olympics.

A pair of other alums also helped their respective countries win B-finals last week, which also was good enough to send boats to Tokyo. Martin Mackovic (2018) helped Serbia take the B-final in the pair while 2016 graduate Niki Van Sprang helped The Netherlands' take the B-final in the double sculls.

The Bears had three others compete at Worlds last week. Natan Wegrzycki-Szymczyk, a 2016 Olympian and 2018 Cal grad, placed fourth in the B-final of the single sculls. Ferdinand Querfeld (2019) rowed in Austria's four and won the C-final, and fellow 2019 graduate Joachim Sutton and Denmark placed third in the C-final of the pair.

Cal has started training for the 2019-20 season and will begin the fall season next month at the Head of the Charles in Cambridge, Mass.