Last Saturday was the Youth Freestyle event on the Washburn River in Yorkshire. Check out the video above that me and Palms Junior star Bren Orton filmed and edited together to see what it was all about.
Its a great series of events for young paddlers of all abilities with the main aim of getting on the water having fun, getting top quality coaching and then doing some fun competitions. I’ve been at 3 YF events now and they have all been great days out showcasing an amazing array of talented young paddlers coming up in the Uk kayak scene. It looks to me like the future of British kayaking is in a very healthy condition.
On the way back to Germany to the site of the 2011 World Champs in Plattling now but here’s a little wrap up of my trip to compete in my first Teva Games in Vail, Colorado.
The first kayak event that was held was the Steep Creek Championship to be held on the Homestake Creek. Anne wrote quite a but about that already on the post below but here’s my personal little take on it.
Its a pretty beautiful area with mountains all around and a very different landscape to anywhere I’ve been before!
I arrived the day before the event started so got to take a few practice runs down. The creek is really rocky & bony but pretty fun to paddle. My main issue was getting the line on the last drop, Leap of Faith. I had two nice lines down it and 2 bad ones in practice. The other thing I noticed was that due to the alltiude here (10,000 feet) you get tired really quickly,, pretty crazy.
In the race the field cut to 22 after the first run with the remaining competitiors getting a second run to sort out the final results. I went pretty hard in the beginning and had quite good lines on the upper section although did get caught up on a few rocks and lost some time there, but i was quite happy anyways until i reached the last drop and screwed up my line. Got backlooped in the drop then stuck up against the wall upside down, took me a good 10 seconds to get back up and get to the finish….
Not the best run for sure, I finished up in 33rd, think i have a quite a bit to learn in creek racing. Mike Dawson were pretty incredible though getting great smooth lines and incredibly managed to tie for top spot down to the hundredth of a second!!!
The results were:-
1st:- Mike Dawson & Honza Lasko
3rd:- Jakub Nemec
Ladies:-
1st:- Adriene Levknect
2nd:-Nikki Kelly
3rd:-Martina Wegman
and Palm’s Anne Hubner in 4th
The next event was the Freestyle Kayak held in the hole at International Bridge.
The feature was good but a little shallow and tricky to set up.
In the qualifying round the field cut to the top 15. I had pretty good rides, did miss a couple moves but was pretty happy wit how it went finishing up in 4th position. Stephen Wright took 1st spot with some huge Loops and Godzilla’s.
The following day were the semi’s in the morning and finals in the evening.
In the semi’s you need to make the top 5 to get in the finals. I felt pretty good, dropping into my run. Had a really good start getting my entry move, both Mc’nasties, both Fonix’s and then went to go do Loops and Godzillas but couldn’t get the pop for it. Still was pretty sure I’d done plenty to make finals so in my second run, i stupidly took it pretty easy to save energy for later.
Results came out and i was sitting down in 8th, in my mind from scoring the video I’ve seen of my ride i came in 3rd… But judging is done in real time, without the benefit of video so mistakes do happen time to time, so just learn my lesson to never take it easy in a ride and move on to my next target, Worlds!
For those that want to check out the 60 second ride judges gave me 590 when it should have been scored 750 at least see:- https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150200452045949&oid=319949401906&comments
Finals were really well fought out however with some great kayaking getting thrown down. First was Dustin Urban with some really nice smooth paddling to beat out Ej who got 2nd with Dane in 3rd.
Womens were 1st Emily Jackson, 2nd Ruth Ebens and 3rd Hayley Mills.
Then the last event was the 8 Ball Kayak which is basically a head to head 6 at a time race down the easy stretch above the freestyle hole to under the bridge with one little twist. The 8ballers, a bunch of kayakers, rafters & SUP’ers whose job it is to take out the racers. i decided not to take part in this one with Worlds being so close, i didn’t want to get hurt but it looked awesome, super carnage!
1st was Mike Dawson, 2nd brendan Bayly and 3rd David Fussili.
Womens 1st was Nicole Mansfield, 2nd Louise Urwin and 3rd Emily Jackson.
Was a really cool competition for sure but now its on to Plattling to get ready for Worlds.
NSR 2010 went off this weekend, and was a huge success all round. Just under 700 competitors and almost 1000 people in all turned up to party and paddle, including guests Rush Sturges and Tyler Bradt, who premiered their new movie ‘Dream Result’ at Saturday night’s party.
The usual mens and women’s competitions ran, as well as c1, squirt, duo, and new for this year the sofa cross, in which 40 teams of 2 raced down the course on inflatable sofas.
Also new to the NSR this year was the entertainment provided by the Rodeo Rabbit who did sterling work all day, and led an epic musical statue dance off before the prize giving.
A huge shout out goes to Andy, Peter, and everybody else at Leeds Uni who put in a huge amount of work to make this event so good.
More photos and a full report coming soon, but for now here’s a short video clip for your enjoyment…
The UK’s National Student Rodeo 2010 is only 2 weeks away, and each year Palm Equipment make a custom NSR Kayak as the prize for the winning uni’s Club.
This year’s boat is a beautiful and unique Dagger Axiom in one off lime green, with NSR decals to finish it off…
To find out more about NSR, the world’s biggest freestyle competition (no, reallly, 750 competitors), visit:
As the WCA’s Freestyle Development Officer I am putting on a series of development weekends across Wales with demo freestyle boats, free coaching and a fun competition. If you or someone you know in Wales is wanting to get into freestyle, then there’s never been a better time to try it. We’re also looking for budding rodeo stars to make up a squad which will compete at freestyle events nationwide. Check out the flyer below:
