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The most experienced woman in the squad, triple Olympic silver medallist Katherine Grainger, has moved into a single for the season, winning in a weak field in Spain but not making the podium in two events since.

And the men's pair of Andy Hodge and Pete Reed, the front half of the Olympic gold medal winning four who have been the country's fastest pair for five years, have been experiencing a form of , finishing behind New Zealand duo Eric Murray and Hamish Bond at their last three encounters. (There is footage of and if you can bear it.)

GB Rowing have agreed with UK Sport a target of four medals at the World Championships in Poznan, Poland, in August but still they are not feeling the pressure to look short-term and put their best rowers in the boats with the best chances of medals.

The of Matt Langridge, Alex Gregory, Richard Egington and Alex Partridge looks most likely to win in Poznan.

Coach Jurgen Grobler could have guaranteed gold by adding Reed and Hodge to the combination, following the route he took in 2004, when he added James Cracknell and Matthew Pinsent to a four that was already strong.

But instead, he has opted to stick with line-ups that could - if all goes to plan - race in London in three years' time, and to give them valuable extra experience.

Smaller boats like singles and pairs offer better learning opportunities as there are fewer places to hide and the world's better athletes tend to compete in those classes.

And these new projects have offered veteran competitors a way of staying fresh in the year after the Olympics, when motivation is always most difficult.

"I haven't thought about another boat since we got into the pair. We don't want to run off to an event we think will be easier," said Reed, who has how his crew is going to beat New Zealand.

The slightly longer-suffering Hodge added: "You've got to look at ways of stimulating performance and making the next step.

"For London we're there to win a gold medal and this is the first step."

Grainger's reasoning is similar, although the prospect of reuniting her Beijing quad of Annabel Vernon, Frances Houghton and Debbie Flood sounds like it may be a possibility when the latter two return from year-long sabbaticals.

"I want to be the best I can be, particularly in three years' time," she told me.

"In the first year of the four-year cycle leading up to 2012 it seemed to be the best plan to move me on.

"There was always the question of, if I wasn't medalling in the single, could I jump into another boat and possibly get a medal and that was an option but I would have been undermining the reason for doing it in the first place."

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts. Are they right to stick with the current project or should they have use the better rowers to strengthen crews with a better chance of gold medals?

I risked outstaying my welcome at the crew announcement at Caversham, gathering interviews that will run in the lead-up to Poznan, while the squads are at various training camps around Europe.

While the GB kitbags are being packed, the rest of the country is preparing for the in Nottingham this weekend, an event that rarely sees a GB international.

With the in October next year, though, the big boys and girls will be given a break after the World Cup season.

As Beth Rodford mentioned in her blog recently, they enjoy those rare chances to race in front of a home crowd so let's hope they take this one - they may not get another chance before 2012.