Since I have been home I have been enjoying catching up with my family, last week we all(minus Izzy) went to Ohakune and celebrated my bros 30th! It was great! And as I am resting from kayaking at the moment I got to enjoy loads of poker games and rock climbing! It even snowed in town which was really cool, unfortunately the Mountain was shut a lot though due to bad weather. I am now back up in Rotorua. I have already been for a few runs on the Kaituna, it was even warm enough for T-shirts! I have been trying to find a job for summer, looking like I will be waitressing. I am heading back to the Mountain for the weekend with hopes of good weather! and then home to study for exams which are coming up!
As the title suggests I have come home to winter! Rain, wind and for the Mountains a lot of snow! The other night we were treated to a powercut due to a storm that hit the central North Island. I have really been enjoying being home with my parents though and have even made a trip to Mangahau to put up Slalom gates (In the rain and freezing cold) with my father and Ian Campbell. Bad weather always gives time to catch up on Uni work too, with exams coming up! Daily reports of 10-20cm fresh snow on my favorite skifield Turoa have me amping. I have picked up a Spring Pass for really cheap and have dusted off my snowboard gears, its time to hit the slopes!
Semi-Finals day for me in C1 was an absolute disaster. It was the end of a long week and I did not have the strength to pull myself together on race day and perform to the standard that I knew was possible. Tacen is not an easy course however and sometimes the drop will dominate. It sure did dominate me, forcing me into a series of Eskimo rolls/power flips. I recovered and had an okay middle section but could not hold it together at the bottom. A few more rolls and 50sec penalties and it was game over. I ended up in 20th position.
Mike and Aaron did not race to their potentials placing in 28th and 37th. Daniele Momenti won the Mens and this was followed by Vavra Hradilek and Jure Meglic in 3rd. Some intense racing to watch.
To end the Worlds we had a big night out with all of the Nations. It was pretty awesome. A good way to end a disappointing World Championships. We then packed our bags, said ‘Au Revoir’ to our friends and took off to Munich to drop Luuka and then Augsburg to stay with our friend Kathrin. Brent and I then flew out of Munich on the Wednesday to arrive back in freezing NZ on the Friday. I arrived home to hot soup, a bath, buckets of rain, 13 new additions to the farm(Lambs), and a windy/wintry conditions! But have been told a Massive dump of snow is expected with 15-30cm freshys! Pow Pow time!
The 2010 Europe Campaign has definitely had a lot of ups and downs for me. I have learnt a lot and despite some hard racing I believe become a lot stronger competitor and most definately more determined and moticated. My paddling has improved a lot and I really looking forward to a hard summer of training to lead me into next year!To wrap up the 2010 World Championships I would like to give a massive 'Thank You' to a few people in particular! There are so many people that have helped me out this year in my lead up in one way or another, so thanks to everyone, you know who you are! Esp. Jane Borren, Sue Clark, Les Dawson, Mum and Dad, Sam Thompson, Thomas Masuy, Kay Dawson, Physio Team, NZL Team mates, Friends, International Friends and many more:)
Today we went down to the course to cheer on our favourites! It was great to watch the action live(of course we would have much rather been racing though). It was awesome though to see three Auzzy chicks in the Finals! The Final results were: C2Men- Hochshorners- SVK, Gaugand/Lafevre- FRA, Houndslow/Florence- GBR K1W- Kuhnle- AUT, Dukatova- SVK, Oblinger-Peters- AUT
This was all followed by teams racing. Jane, Luuka and I put down a fairly clean run and placed in 8th! Pretty sweet really!!! I actually felt awful as I didn't paddle well and rolled on my way into the first upstream and took a few spins...recovered well however. Tommorrow I race C1 at 932am our time. Mike Dawson will race at 1152am and Aaron Osbourne at around 1230.
Yesterday the K1Men had their Qualification Race. This saw New Zealanders Mike Dawson through to the Semis in 37th and Aaron Oabourne through in 30th. The racing here has been great and very exciting to watch! Today Luuka Jones, Jane Nicholas and I will be racing in the Teams Race! The Boys have teams tommorrow. I will also be racing my C1W Semi-Final tommorrow. The course for Semi-Finals and Finals will be the same as the Qualifications course.
Race day is always a bit of a rollercoaster of emotions. There is the excitement you get when you wake up and prepare your gear, the focus and serious face then comes on when you see the course, this is followed by excitement again, along with nerves and then the highlight comes when you take off from the start line. Sitting on the start line was a different story for me this year. This is because this year I nearly wasn’t able to even be here...when I first hurt my shoulder I thought I was on the next plane home to NZ. I was fortunate however to have a quick recovery which saw me through to being here today. So for me, I was just so happy to be on the start today! In the warm up pool I felt reasonably relaxed but excited! I was happy and felt totally ready to go. First Run: K1- I thought I had it covered, but totally messed up the move on the drop which meant I was very slow coming into the first upstream gate on the right. Cleaned up middle and then had a wee mistake around gate 10 and lost focus, cut lines tight...game over. Got a 50 too. Runtime: 137
Second Run: K1- I knew I had to lay it down, last chance. Started okay and then came a bit high in gate 4 and the rest was slow and not efficient. I did some things worse than my first run and some things better. Runtime: 137
I felt disappointed with my mornings racing. I didn’t perform as well as I had hoped and was gutted because I had been feeling really good in the sessions leading up to the race. Despite the fact I had 3weeks off I think my performance reflected some important things. There were moments in my runs where I used the water well this reflects my ability to negotiate white water. There were moments however when I failed to execute moves well. I don’t know if I hadn’t been injured I would have done much better...The thing is, my whole perception and race head would be so different. But at the end of the day I am not fast enough yet. Maybe if I had put down my best possible run I would have made the cut. Basically I think I have a lot of work to do and am looking forward to going home and getting a game plan that will help me progress more. My result this year is worse than last year yet I do think my paddling has improved a lot! My paddling is improving but it will be great to get home soon and be able to get to work early so by this time next year I can sit on the start line and know that I have had the best preparation possible!
Racing C1: Yes that is right...I ended up racing C1. I decided a few hours before the race to take my place on the start line. After a quick walk through of the course I jumped on warmed up and away I went. I had a fair bit of aggression in my strokes and managed to nail the top move! Stoked as! I continued down the course negotiating the holes and features as I went. I actually had a pretty okay run and managed to get all of the gates, that is until I missed the last two downstream gates on the course!(Without these 50s I would have been in 8th). My 2nd run was a nightmare. I ended up placing in 19th- Top 20 go through to the Semi-Finals which are meant to be held on Sunday.
I do feel that not having raced since the World Cups has had a big impact on my racing this week. Because I was injured I was not able to race the Slovak Open and this made it really hard for me to get back into the zone of racing after a two month break! Other Kiwis that raced today included Luuka Jones who placed 35th, she missed the Semi-Finals by 2seconds. Ella and Jane Nicholas also missed the Semis. We also had 3C1Men, Brent Bastin, Shaun Higgins and Ben Gibb who all missed the Semi-Finals too. Tommorrow we will be cheering on New Zealand’s K1Men, including Mike Dawson, Aaron Osbourne and Johann Roozenburg.
Tonight the Opening Ceremony for the 2010 Canoe Slalom World Championships will commence here in Ljubljana, Slovenia. We had our last session on the White Water course here today and it is pretty exciting to think that tomorrow the racing begins. Tomorrow the schedule has changed and they are now running the women in the morning along with the C2M and the C1W will race in the afternoon along with the C1Men. I am off at 1058am and then again at 1258. The weather lately has been pretty cold and there has been a lot of rain, unfortunate, especially for some paddlers such as team-mate Luuka Jones who has already shipped all of her long sleeve Cags home to New Zealand! K1M will have their qualifications on Thursday with Team Races on Friday. Checkout: www.123result.com for live results.
As the title suggests the time has come for the 2010 Canoe Slalom World Championships to begin! With exactly 1week until racing the atmosphere here in Ljubljana is hyped and exciting! Teams have been arriving in full force and Tacen has become a busy place to be. Today Luuka and I missioned it up the hill, Smarna Gora, this hill overlooks the whole city and surrounding area!Awesome!
Too much rain dancing has led to the river gods letting loose in the depths of the Slovenian Mountains, causing the rivers to rise and Tacen to become a raging torrent! We are enjoying the change of waters. Check out Luuka's blog for pics.
some Training on the course is going really well. The whole New Zealand Team is now here in Tacen, Slovenia! Here are some pictures from Augsburg of the 'Waiariki 5'! Crazy to think that was 2months ago, feels like only yesterday! My physios are happy with my progress and I am stoked to be paddling again:)
Last week I spent a lot of my time either running the streets of Ljubljana, at the physio or in the gym, or doing uni work of course:). My shoulder was feeling a lot better and I was able to do a lot more with it, by the Thursday afternoon (3weeks since injury) I was back on flatwater gates in both my C1 and K1, and it felt okay. All of the New Zealanders went to Bratislava last weekend to race at the Pre World Championships. Mike Dawson, Luuka Jones and Aaron Osbourne all qualified through to the Semi-finals! Check out results here: http://www.lomtec.com/cunovo/index.cfm?Area=ResultList I wanted to give my shoulder a bit more time to heal before jumping in to White Water so I took off to Croatia and met up with my sister Izzy! It was amazing! So beautiful and a spectacular trip. Izzy and I started in the walled off town of Dubrovnik and made our way up the coast to end up in Zadar. The coast was amazing and the water was so clear you could see for a good 10m infront of you. I was stunned by the geography of the environment, it was not at all what I expected. In Croatia there is a lot of high hills that are really close to the coast, one minute you are in the mountains and the next you are in the sea! It was also the best time ever with my sister Izzy, I really loved being with her again as I might not be seeing her for a while, she now lives and works in London! I had trouble sleeping last night as I was getting excited...today I got back on the White Water!!!I did K1 as this has the least impact on my shoulder. It actually felt really good to be back on the white water, I know the course here well and I felt in sync with the flow of the water. I got off early though as my shoulder is still a bit tender and was feeling a bit sore. 2weeks now till the World Championships here in Ljubljana Slovenia!
Photo credits: Johann Roozenburg Life continues with sun, walks, amazing baking, music, and now that the Canadian's have arrived- smack talking. Its nearly been two weeks now since I injured my shoulder and have not been able to paddle. This week I begun exercise again starting with walking and now I am back at the gym too, I go everyday. Ive even been doing a bit of exploring in the hills and bush that is right in our backyard! I have been going to the physio daily and have to say that the team of Physio's that look after me totally rock! Last night we went out for Les's Birthday and had Mexican!It was awesome! We then went into the beautiful city of Ljubljana for a few quiet drinks.
Today Brent, Thomas, Les, Johann, Peta and I drove to Koper on the coast of Slovenia. It was a beautiful day and great for sunbathing! We enjoyed gelatos and frozen juice and the pure salty water that was pretty much see through! It was a really good break. The Auzzy chicks and I checked out the markets on the wkd which was pretty fun. I have been trying to keep myself busy and occupied to keep my mind off my sore arm. Its horrible, I am not in a good way, I will go back to the Physio today where they will do some scans and begin work on my shoulder. Still super gutted. But I have plans to go to the coast of Croatia for a week. Head to one of the Islands and Rest and Rehabilitat!Otherwise I have been catching up with lots of University work. The last photo is a view from the Kiwi Mansion: Photo curtesy of Johann Roosenburg.
Since I have been home I have been enjoying catching up with my family, last week we all(minus Izzy) went to Ohakune and celebrated my bros 30th! It was great! And as I am resting from kayaking at the moment I got to enjoy loads of poker games and rock climbing! It even snowed in town which was really cool, unfortunately the Mountain was shut a lot though due to bad weather.
