Upstate NY native just misses medaling in women's 8 rowing at Paris Olympics

Meghan Musnicki , Olivia Coffey and the rest of USA women’s 8 rowing crew just missed medaling in the final Saturday at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.

The U.S. team ended the 2,000-meter race with a time of 6:01.73 at the Vaires-Sur-Marne Nautical Stadium, about six seconds behind the gold-medal pace. Romania, Canada and Great Britain finished first, second and third, respectively, with times just below six minutes.

The USA crew were just two seconds off the bronze medal pace of 5:59.51.

Musnicki, who already possesses two previous Olympic gold medals (London 2012 and Rio 2016), has been making history in Paris. The 41-year-old Naples native is the oldest American woman to row at the Olympics.

Musnicki, a 5-foot-11 rower whose nickname is “Moose,” described how hard Olympic-level rowing is in a YouTube short earlier this summer by NBC News’ 1 ^st Look TV.

“Rowing hurts. It is incredibly uncomfortable,” she said. “The best way I can describe it is to go outside, lace up your running shoes and run as fast as you possibly can for six minutes and don’t slow down.

“And in fact, get a little bit faster when you go to the end.”

Musnicki missed out on a chance to tie Elle Logan as America's rower with the most gold medals in the women's 8.

For Coffey of Burdett, (near Watkins Glen), it was her second Olympics. She and Musnicki were part of a fourth-place finish at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics in the women's 8.

A pair of New Yorkers have already medaled in Paris.

On Thursday, the Hudson Valley's Kate Douglass picked up a gold medal in the women's 200-meter breaststroke, while Claire Weinstein won a silver medal in the women's 4X200 freestyle relay. Meanwhile, Nick Mead, a Cornell University grad, won a gold medal in men's four rowing.

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Upstate NY native just misses medaling in women's 8 rowing at Paris Olympics