KEY POINTS:
It doesn't look good for Mahe Drysdale.
With the two-time world champion having bounced back from two close losses to Olympics rival Rob Waddell to win their third encounter, Drysdale's thrashing at the hands of Waddell on a wind-whipped Lake Karapiro on Saturday came as a bit of
a shock.
It wasn't so much the defeat, but the manner of it, with three lengths of daylight coming second and Drysdale a distant, bedraggled third.
Poor old Mahe looks on the verge of seeing his Olympic dream, if not exactly shattered, then at least severely repackaged.
Sure, the races that count towards Olympic selection are still ahead. But it doesn't look good for Mahe.
For starters, Waddell has one of the highest VO2 max intake levels recorded by an athlete. This column has absolutely no idea what that means, but it was mentioned in his Wikipedia profile and sounds impressive.
Waddell looks the better athlete. If the pair were standing side by side and your life depended on picking one of them to triumph at any random sporting endeavour, you'd pick the muscle-bound Waddell over the lithe Drysdale any day.
If grinding on a yacht came out of the hat, you'd be quids in. But you'd also back Waddell to win at cage fighting, Greco Roman wrestling, water polo and bobsleigh.
Much has been made of the way Waddell has shed 20kg to get back in rowing trim.
To quote pretty much any teenage girl in the western world: what-eva. Dropping a bit of muscle mass when you're a finely tuned, world-class athlete wouldn't involve much more than laying off the protein shakes and switching from weights to cardio in the gym.
Presumably that VO2 max intake wouldn't do you any harm either. It's a fair bet Waddell would have found it easier to trim down than your average 150kg jellybaby who has been anchored to the couch by their enormous buttocks for a decade.
Give the man credit though, he seems to have made a fair go of his return to sculling. If Rob does tip Mahe out of his boat, it'll be hard not to feel sorry for the reigning two-time world champ. But it will also have been an incredible sporting endeavour and one deserving of great praise. So much praise in fact that you could pretty much already give Waddell this year's supreme Halberg award to go with the two he's already got.
That might seem a touch presumptuous with last year's winner Valerie Vili seemingly on a roll to Olympic glory, but I'll wager that the winner of Rob v Mahe IV and V goes on to win at Beijing and picks up the major gong at next year's Muzzas.
The Halberg judges' bias towards Olympic sports - and rowing in particular - is unparalleled. (If this column is starting to read like a thinly disguised airing of a deep-seated grievance, then it's bang on track.)
As arbiters of sporting attainment, the judges threw away what little credibility they had when they didn't even shortlist the 2005 Tri-Nations-winning Kiwis for team of the year.
A team that achieved the greatest result in the 100-year history of its sport in this country was snubbed in favour of three rowing crews.
Sure, you can raise the usual arguments about league, such as there only being three nations who are any good, but the globe isn't exactly awash with coxless fours either.
Rowing doesn't exist in Africa, Asia, the Pacific rim or the Middle East. China's interest will pass after Beijing, so doesn't really count.
Posh Europe, the colonies and the odd upper-class university in Northern America are the sport's strongholds.
League, on the other hand, has a huge global following. Hasam El Masri, for example, is second only to Muhammad in popularity in both Lebanon and a suburb of Sydney.
Whose 2005 sporting efforts are more etched on NZ minds - Ruben Wiki or George Bridgewater?
A reminder: Bridgewater was one half of the rowing duo that won the team Halberg that year.
What about Nicky Coles and Juliette Haigh? Remember them? They were finalists.
Okay, there may be the odd gaping hole in those arguments, but it hardly matters. When it comes to rowing and the Halberg judges, there is no argument - unless they're debating the merits of various rowing crews.
Waddell and Drysdale have three supreme awards between them. Philippa Baker has two and the Evers-Swindell twins have one. In four of the past five years, the team award has gone to rowing. No other sport comes close to matching those numbers.
This year, for the second time in three years, three of the four team finalists were rowing crews. The other was Team New Zealand. Can anyone say "watersports fixation"?
Sorry Valerie, but it's a done deal. Whoever wins out of Mahe and Rob is a shoo-in.
Funny thing is, for once they probably should be.
If you've had to beat the next-best athlete in your sport in the world just to get to the Olympics, you probably deserve an award.
Forget about the rugby - by the look of the empty stands in S14 most people already have - or the cricket, Rob v Mahe is the most enthralling show in town this summer.
It's sport at its pure best, mano-a-mano, Bone Crusher v Our Waverly Star, VO2 max intake v VO2 max intake. It's just a pity the Halbergs aren't contested on such even footing.
* Readers of last week's column will be delighted to learn that Digby Ioane's S14 try tally remains at 0. Actually, given the try he single-handedly gifted the Hurricanes on Friday night, it probably should be - 1. That's if it was in fact the same player. By the time the Reds got to Wellington, the hugely promising love child of the Fox commentary team, Digby I-owe-knee, seemed to have been replaced by a nervy, inexperienced kid called Digby Juan-A. But 48 hours pledges to get to the bottom of this mystery.
