BC Championships on the Rutherford Whitewater Park

The BC Whitewater Championships were held this past weekend on the Rutherford Whitewater Park, Canada's first and only purpose built whitewater park. The event was hosted by Canoe Kayak BC, Rutherford Creek Power and Innergex.

The event went off without a hitch and marks a milestone for Canadian Paddling. Kelly Vanderbeek put together a short montage on the weekends events and can be viewed on youtube at http://youtube.com/watch?v=0Fo242trjSQ

The course can be best described as Bourg St. Maurice meets Bratislava and is a fun and challenging track. There is no doubt that whitewater sport in BC is moving into a new and exciting era.

See you on the river!

Next Stop Beijing

Home at last for ten days before heading to Beijing for the Games. The past four weeks in Europe for the World Cup were tough mentally and physically. We made a conscious decision to train through the races this year and it made for some interesting racing. The points race was tight and I hung on to the top ten finishing ninth in the overall. I am happy with how I am paddling but still not race ready and it showed. It will be nice to start the taper and begin final preparations for Beijing.

Kelly made a video montage from footage she shot while she was with me in Beijing. She did a great job and you can view it on Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zAIeDVMXJI.

Final Olympic Selection

The Pan American championships and final Olympic Qualifier are in the bag and it was an intense three days of racing. I was successful in earning my fifth Olympic birth but in retrospect going to selection directly from a training camp in Beijing might not have been the best idea I have ever had. The amount of travel and the intensity of training in Beijing made being race ready very difficult.

Still I was able to have solid runs and had a very consistent weekend. I was very impressed with the level of paddling displayed by the other Canadians, I did not expect that level of competition and I think it bodes well for the future of slalom in Canada. The days where I could arrive as I did this year without having done any race specific lactic work or really any speed work to speak of are long gone. The level has risen to the point where the Canadian National team trials are a formidable event that must be taken as seriously as any other major competition. This is a big step for our program.

Now it is time to buckle down and focus on getting into that ever important race shape, converting all of the technical work into a fit and fast racing mode. May will be spent working hard on strength, speed and the lactic system before heading back to Beijing at the end of the month for a technical camp. I am looking forward to sharpening the tip of the sword and seeing just how fast I can push the new model.

Pan Am Championships

After a very intense week in China on the Olympic course I find myself once again in Charlotte North Carolina for the Pan American Championships and final Olympic Qualifier. The time on the course in Beijing definitely set me up well for the difficult conditions here on the Charlotte course, the river in Beijing is a monster and everything here feels a little bit more manageable. I am looking forward to the events.

Renowned Irish film maker Eoin R Speilberg produced a short video of me from our February training camp which you can find at this link. It will give you an idea of the difficulty here on the course in Charlotte.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7z0xQST8tA

Racing

Our most recent camp in Charlotte North Carolina ended with an international competition with athletes from Canada, the USA, Europe and South America. As always the course was challenging and there were many spills and thrills.

 

I was happy with my competition considering our priority is still squarely set on training. The volume was quite intense with all of our paddling sessions for the two week period being out on the whitewater. The gym work also compounded the stress on our bodies and by the time the race came around we were dragging our feet a little bit.

 

I have been struggling with my first runs in the early races this year so I wanted to be sure that I was as precise as possible and attack the first run. I have been working very hard with my coach Han Bijnen to create a solid platform to race from and while it was a little mechanical I was happy that I was able to execute the model quite well. I finished the first run in first place, right where I need to be.

 

Second runs saw the wind pick up a little and the fatigue set in as well. Still I had a solid run with one mistake near the bottom, good enough to take first place, my first win of the season. You can check out video of my first run at the following link:

 

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1431817087735249090

 

Now it is a little time at home before heading to Beijing for a camp on the Olympic course before returning to Charlotte NC for the Pan Am championships at the end of April. I will be putting my head down and working hard to get some intense training done and in the bank for later in the year.

 

NEW BOATS

I have just received a new boat from Galasport and I am amazed at how identical the cut is. I measured it against my other new boat that arrived in November and most of the measurements are identical and those that are different are only out by 1mm. I am curious to get them both out on the water and see how they feel, it will be hard to decide which one to leave in Beijing without really having time to test them both. It’s a good position to be in to have two great new boats to choose from.

Home

Home again, for a night or two at least. Australia was a great camp despite the unseasonably cold and rainy weather and I feel like the work I did with Han was extremely valuable. Everything feels like it is moving in the right direction. Next up is a camp in Charlotte and then off to Beijing for a camp before returning to Charlotte for the final Olympic selection event and the Pan Am championships. Those frequent flyer miles just keep on piling up.

World Series Race #1

2008 has started in earnest with the qualifier for the first World Series event in the bag. In the men’s kayak class 110 competitors started the race with no fewer than 5 past and present world champions and the reigning Olympic champion as well. It is by far the best World Series start line to date.

 

My day started with a solid run marred by one bad split section and a touch. I felt good during warm up despite the early 8:17 am start time but was not quite on my A game. Fabien Doerfler of Germany led the first runs and I was quite happy to have most of my splits on pace with his.

 

Second runs I was much more within myself and tried to go for controlled precision and had one of those effortless runs. There were a few places I probably should have pressed a little bit harder but I wanted to test the waters on my pacing model and stuck to my plan. I managed to move up to 7^th place for the day and my time was good enough for one of the fastest on the day, in fact if you double my second run time it would have won the competition by over 1.5 seconds. Not a bad start.

 

Tomorrow is the semi final and the A and B final so it will be a full day of racing. I am curious to see how things will shake out.

Where is the sun?

While I must admit it is better for training, coming all this way for cloudy weather is not really the point. Still it is good to be training down here again with lots of really fast paddlers from all over the world. With the World Series starting here in only a couple of weeks it will be fun to get back into the competitive groove.

 

The course here which was used for the 2000 Olympic Games has been modified significantly taking advantage of the design features which allow for the obstacles to be moved quite easily. The course has significantly more texture in what I assume is an attempt to emulate the conditions in Beijing. Having spent so much time here it will be good to have a slightly different environment to paddle on.