Training Video

Bratislava- 1week till World Champs!

I came back to Bratislava after my time at the Czech Championships and European Extreme Champs on a bit of a high! It was just so awesome to get back on good white water and I really enjoyed my time there.
Thanks to the Slovak Raft team for the ride back to Bratislava! :)
When I arrived back I was greeted by my sister Izzy who is still here in Europe finishing off her Euro summer tour! I was really happy to see her again! Then only days later my oldest sister Heather arrived! I am really happy to have them here, they are awesome sisters and good fun to be around!
On a more serious note...there is now only one week till the Canoe Slalom World Championships here in Bratislava of Slovakia! The course has become a busy place with Nations flooding in from all corners of the World!
I am feeling great and really excited about the racing that will commence in a week! Sweeeet!
For info on the event, checkout: http://www.canoeslalom2011.com/

Lipno, Czech Republic- Slalom and Extreme!

Wow, what an epic weekend!
After some hard weeks training for the World Champs here in Bratislava it was time for a break from Slovakia and time to hit up the Czech Republic for some white water kayaking and racing!
Lipno is a beautiful scenic village that is just over the Austrian border and lies in some small mountains in the Czech Republic. It has beautiful pristine lakes and an awesome river that is sadly dammed and only flows one weekend per year!
Mike, Luuka, Ciaran, Katrina (Canada), Phill G and myself rocked up and stayed along side all of the Czech paddlers in a nice restaurant/hotel that overlooked the countryside. The first day we relaxed under the sun and enjoyed some nice swimming in the lake.
Friday the river came up and it was game time! After a few runs down the awesome slalom course I jumped into a creek boat and followed Mike, Phill and Vavra down the whole river. An awesome run and it felt soooo good to be back in a plastic boat! The river hosts continuous waves and some really fun weirs and rapids. It really got my adrenalin pumping and I was stoked!
Saturday was race day! I put down a solid run in the slalom to safely qualify through to the finals in 6th. I then boosted to the extreme race to qualify 1st spot in the final of the womans individual. Unfortunately I didn't pull through in the final and placed 2nd to Anne Hubner of Germany. I was very happy with 2nd prize however, big thanks to Teva, Hiko sport and the other sponsors of the event!
I then raced back up for my final run in the slalom which placed me in 7th, I carried a lot of adrenalin from the extreme race into the first half of my run which was primo, but blew out halfway down in one of the upstreams!
Sunday I raced again in the Slalom but didn't quite fire. I just scraped into the finals with a clean run and then when trying to cut the lines I incurred a 50second penalty and it was game over!
I am super happy with the weekend of racing and enjoyed my time in Lipno a lot. It was great to get back in the plastic boat and I feel a lot more confident about my paddling at the moment. Big thanks to all the Czechs for hosting us, especially Vavra! Also to the organisers of the extreme race, you guys made it an awesome event! Check it out: Devils Extreme Race!
Big ups to Mike Dawson who took out the mens individual, Jamie Sutton for winning the head to head and Sam Sutton, Jamie Sutton and Brendan Bayly for placing 3rd in the Teams! Yeah Kiwi domination! It was really awesome to catchup with the Kiwi's too!

In the Slalom Mike made finals both days also and Luuka also made finals on the Sunday!
Photo credit: Ciaran McArdle Heartau and www.devilsextremerace.com, Arnd Schaeftlein and Ladislav Vlcek

Bratislava Sun

I was fortunate enough this week to have my sister Izzy come and visit! She is currently coming to the end of her European holiday and will be heading back to work in the UK in a few weeks. It was really nice to have her around and while she was here I took her out to see some of Bratislavas hot spots! the castle, Slovak food and on my rest day we went for a ride out to some beautiful lakes, one of which turned out to be a nudist lake...I wasn't to know. Along the way we met up with some of my Slovak friends that were on skates, skating is a massive sport here in Slovakia! I think it is the reasoning behind all the skinny and tanned beautiful woman here!

Training continues to go well and its not long now till I boost to the Czech Republic!

Training in Bratislava

V.H The Machine in B.A from Twelve Productions on Vimeo.

Training here in Bratislava is going well.
The 2week countdown has begun till the 2011 Canoe Slalom World Championships!
On thursday I am heading to the outback of the Czech Republic (Lipno) for the Czech Republic Championships and to hit up The Devils Extreme Race!
Checkout this sweet vid of Vavra, made by Mike.

Prague- World Cup 4!

Prague always provides an awesome atmosphere and venue for a world cup! The crowds are always big, the racing is always tight and the after party is always raging!
Race day was not great for the Kiwi's with noone moving through to the semi-finals. My 2nd run was my fastest and it was with some small mistakes and a touch. It was good to get another race under my belt and gave me some things to work on in terms of race strategy that I will take into the World Champs that are in just less then a month away now!
I spent the week staying once again in the Hradilek mansion in the outback of Zbuzany (the Otaki of the Czech Republic). Vashek placed 11th in the C2 and Vavra once again showed that he can be the fastest man on the circuit brining home the gold in front of his home crowd! On the Qualification day he was even 4seconds up on Peter Kauzer who was in 2nd!
Roz Lawrence my Auzzy partner in crime dominated the C1W! The young Slovenian pair took the gold in C2Men, Slovaks Elena Kaliska in the womens and Slafkovsky in the C1Men. For full race results checkout:
www.live.results.cz

Photo Credit to my friends Martin Hammer and Ciaran Mc Ardle Heurteau

Bratislava- Prague

I am now residing in a typical commu tower Slovak style flat in one of Bratislava’s suburbs, known as Petrzalka. It is a 10min walk to Bratislava’s shopping mecca known as ‘Aupark’ and an easy 20-25min drive to the white water course in Cunovo. I live with a Slovak couple- Adrian and his partner (whose name I cannot pronounce yet letalone spell) and another Slovak chick, Emma. I am of course stoked to be back living in Bratislava! I have been treated to games of basketball and bbq’s in the evening with my Slovak friends.
On Monday I headed to Prague with Mike to prepare for the fourth and final World Cup! I am staying here in Zbuzany at my good Czech friend Vavra's place, its really sweet here. I am looking forward to once again getting on the startline a World Cup here in Praha, it is always an awesome atmosphere here with a good crowd!

London-Budapest, Hungary!

After an epic week in London on the wicked white water course and staying in Luxury home accommodation at Paula’s Mums place it was time to head back to Eastern Europe. Luuka and I flew into Bratislava and it was time to settle into our new homes. For me I moved into a room in a Slovak flat with some other Slovaks. My room is big and I am living in the suburb of Petrazelka that rests in between the course and the city of Bratislava. On arrival at my new flat I was gifted a small plant to lighten up my room! After a nice lunch with some of my Slovak friends and a bbq I was on my way to Hungary’s capital city- Budapest! The idea was that I needed a few days of rest out of the kayak and so I arranged to meet up with my Brother in law Johnny!

Budapest is an amazing city! We walked and walked the streets in search of some interesting sights and we were very satisfied with what we came across. The city is host to an amazing castle and many many amazing buildings, including its parliamentary building that has 365 points to represent every day of the year! I was really stoked to be there and Johnny and I had a blast, we visited the ‘House of Terror’ which was a depressing museum about the history of Hungary and then to end our trip we took a long relaxing dip in the infamous thermal pools.

Now I am back in Bratislava enjoying my final day of rest, tomorrow I will be back in the boat!

London finale

The London Pre-Olympic Test event was a very successful and enjoyable event to be a part of. I feel privilged to have had the opportunity to race here on the Olympic course and amoung the worlds best! Mike Dawson of NZ was the only Kiwi to move on to the next round of racing and only just missed the semi placing in a creditable 16th place. Here is a video of my friend Vavra Hradilek, he is the man! He not only dominated the mens and won with a 2second penalty but he also helped coach me over the weekend which was super awesome! Big congrats to Vavra:)
Tommorrow morning we will be seizing the day nice and early with a 630am flight to Bratislava! Then I am off to Hungary for a few days of much needed rest and to meet up with my brother in law, Johnny!

Pre Olympic Test Event!

It has been an awesome week here in London training on the Olympic course! The racing kicked off yesterday with the K1Men and C1Men and Mike Dawson put down two very smooth runs to safely secure himself a spot in the next round that will be tommorrow. Luuka Jones and myself were lucky enough to have the likes of Mike and Vavra to walk the course with us and better prepare us for the racing, however we both missed the cut due to penalties and mistakes.
Although my results are average and I did not perform as I would have liked I really enjoyed the event and racing today. The white-water course here is so awesome and it was a competitive field with only the best few from each Nation being able to compete at this event.

Here are my runs:
1-

And the second run that starts at 2mins on the youtube vid...
2-

London Olympic Course- Training

London Olympic Course!

It wouldn’t be a Kiwi kayak trip to Europe if it was without a trip on the train with the kayak! After a nice dinner at the Slovak Pub in Bratislava with my Canadian friend Thea, her parents, Mike, Ciaran and Vavra I was London bound. It was a smooth check-in with Ryanair and we were off to the land of double decker buses, Big Ben and the home of the 2012 Olympics- London! On arrival at the airport I jumped on the Liverpool express with my kayak and trained out to the near suburbs of the white-water stadium and Canoe Slalom 2012 Olympic venue. I was met by my good British friend Lizzie and Luuka. We decided to hit London town and were treated to an awesome meal in the centre of London at a food chain called ‘Leon’, the food was delicious and a nice change from the Eastern European cuisine. Paula Volkmer, a stylee creeker from here in Great Britain has kindly offered to put Luuka and I up for the week so we are staying in her home 20minutes from the course, which is totally preemo! Last night we had home-made pizza which was the most Kiwi meal I have had since I have been away, was amazing!

The London Olympic Canoe Slalom venue is awesome, the facilities include a big white-water course that is challenging-even to the best paddlers of the world, a smaller channel for the less advanced paddlers (but still a descent training channel with good features), a flatwater pool and great showers and other facilities. Training on the course is really fun and you must be really attentive as the white-water is very continuous with holes, waves and other features that demand attention. I am really happy to be here and paddling on the Olympic course, the event next weekend is a test event for the Olympics next year so will be run in a very similar format. I am really glad I came here, it is going to be a good week.

Slovakia

The last week here in Slovakia has been totally awesome! Training has been super good here on the super sweet white-water course and my time inbetween sessions has been filled with volleyball, table tennis, reading books in the hammocks, drinking kofola, pivo and great coffee with friends:). The other night my Auzzy friend Roz and I slept outside on the trampoline under the stars!It was really nice and a bit of fun, even if it did turn a bit windy! The weather has generally been really hot which has called for swims down the course to cool off! Although last night we experienced some furious thunder and lightning! The training slots have quietened down after the nation training last week which has meant training has not been too crowded and I have been fortunate to join in with some friends from abroad on there sessions, including some sessions with my Slovak mates:). Another few days of training before boarding the plane and hitting up London town on Friday! Sweet!

Bratislava Training!

5 Continents and 11 Nations are to start in this afternoons white-water training Race here on the course in Bratislava. To wrap up a solid week of training some coaches have put together a race course that provides all the elements of a typical race, including a competitive field. Training here this week has been awesome, I am really glad I came! Although definitely feeling a bit tired, the white-water here is on a much higher level than the mellow flows of the Kaituna. Next stop will be London next Friday night!

World Cup Vid

Bratislava, Slovakia!

After a quick stopover in Berlin I cruised to the great Slovak city of Bratislava! I am stoked to be back here! I am staying in one of the bungalows here at the white-water centre which is super sweet accommodation. It is cheap as to eat at the restaurant here at the course, 10euro per day and the food is delicious. It is awesome to paddle on the white-water here in Cunovo, I wish every slalom course was as exciting as this one! It provides waves that give you air and holes and drops to ensure you get lots of work on your boof. The Worlds are going to be awesome here and it is really motivating to be here!