The attendance may have been low at this year’s surfski Molokai (Kaiwi Channel Crossing), but the speeds were high. Danielle Mackenzie Richards of New Zealand broke the women’s record, and local paddler Pat Dolan fought an incredibly close race with four-time Molokai winner Cory Hill (AUS) to break the men’s race record.
At the Canoe Sprint World Cup in Poznan, several athletes who’ve previously focussed more on crew boats have found a chance to shine, including women’s kayakers Anna Pulawska (POL) and Natalia Drobot (AUS) as well as men’s canoeist Gabriele Casadei (ITA).
Excellent as expected performances included Aimee Fisher (NZL), Zsoka Csikos (HUN), Nan Wang (CHN), Balint Kopasz (HUN), Josef Dostal (CZE), Jakob Thordsen (GER), and Agustin Vernice (ARG).
In women’s canoe, Katie Vincent (CAN) redeemed her fourth place 200m finish in Szeged when she won gold medals in both the 500m and 200m races. Ukrainian paddler Liudmyla Luzan hadn’t raced in Szeged, but showed that she’s still on top with a silver medal in the 500m. It was Luzan’s teammate Iryna Fedoriv (UKR) who took the silver medal in the 200m race, in dramatic style.Looking at the 5km races, Billy fanboys over men’s race winner Mads Brandt Pedersen (DEN). Hungarian Zsoka Csikos continued her season of stunners with a win in the 5km women’s race. Team GB outperformed themselves with silver and bronze medals for C1 paddler Beth Gill and K1 paddler Emma Russell, respectively.
As exciting as these races to watch, many of the top names seem to have started to avoid them, and experienced paddlers are left wondering whether the portages have been added to sprint races just for Planet Canoe to get viral video views. The 5km at the end of a tough weekend of racing used to feel like a treat for athletes, but now it seems like they’re more of a punishment.
Paracanoe athletes, including many 2024 Olympians, faced off for the first time since Paris. After a quick review of paracanoe technology (K versus V, and L1/L2/L3), Betsy and Billy dive into the results where Team GB once again led the medal count. Some Olympic results were flipped around, including in the men’s VL2 and women’s VL3 races, SUP is just wrapping up 6 weekends of back-to-back racing. In Barcelona, Mariecarmen Rivera from Puerto Rico finally beat Esperanza Barreras of Spain in a long distance race, but it wasn’t how anyone expected it to happen. Highlights of the racing also included Alba Frey’s strategic risks with lines, and the dogfight behind Shuri Araki “Shrimpy” in the men’s field, as well as the technical race win on Sunday from up-and-comer 15 year old Sveva Sabato of Italy.
Looking ahead to next weekend, the big event is the Lake Rocks Festival in Austria. On the men’s side, it could be a race between Donato Freens (NED) and Michael Booth “Boothy” (AUS) with some particularly strong racing in the men’s age categories (Peter Weidert, Joep van Bakel, and Gabor Szabo are top contenders), and hopefully a tight distance race between Csillag Kocsis (HUN) and Espe Barreras (ESP).
00:27 Molokai Results & Records
06:22 Sprint Canoe World Cup #2 in Poznan, Poland
14:07 Poznan’s 5km Races20:36 Paracanoe Races in Poznan
25:47 Marathon kayak races from South Africa, the Eastern and Western Cape marathon champs
27:21 Barcelona World SUP Fest
35:54 Lake Rocks Festival Austria preview
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