Great Britain’s men’s eight added to their world honours by winning the Olympic title at Paris 2024.

Morgan Bolding, Sholto Carnegie, Jacob Dawson, Tom Digby, Charlie Elwes, Tom Ford, Rory Gibbs and James Rudkin withstood challenges from the Netherlands and the United States to win in five minutes 22.88 seconds. Britain and the Netherlands set their stall out from the start and were neck and neck at the 1,000 metres halfway stage.

The double European and double world champions during this Olympic cycle broke clear over the next 500, completing a brilliant victory to beat the Dutch by over one second.

It was a second British medal of the day after the women’s team took bronze in their final. The crew of Annie Campbell-Orde, Holly Dunford, Emily Ford, Lauren Irwin, Heidi Long, Rowan McKellar, Eve Stewart and Hattie Taylor finished third behind world champions Romania and Canada in a time of five minutes 59.51 seconds.

Romania forced the pace from the start and never looked like being caught. Britain tried to squeeze Canada in the final 250 but finished 0.67secs down on the reigning Olympic champions.

Cox Henry Fieldman had won bronze in the Tokyo GB men’s eight three years ago and repeated the feat in the women’s boat.