EXTREME KAYAK WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP 2010
ADIDAS-SICKLINE, AUSTRIA 2010-9-30/2010-10-2
RIVER
SECTION
DIFFICULTY
Oetz (Austrian Alps)
Wellebrucke
V
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15th OF THE WORLD!
Photo: Laura Mas
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2010 was my first competition year on plastic boats. Since 2005 I was kayaking the Bliss-Stick SCUD loving it, very manoeuvrable, but it was slow too. The “Blondie” was out of shape and in March 2010 I changed to the Bliss-Stick Mystic and I started flowing fast.
After competing in some races, at the end of September 2010 I went to the ADIDAS-SICKLINE Extreme Kayak World Championship in Oetz (Austria). We went 10 Pyrenean Extreme Kayakers (PEK) together like a team: 3 catalonians (Gerd&Aniol Serrasolses, Marc Parra), 4 french (Eric Deguil, Fabrice Pouyeto, Bastien and Thomas) and 3 basques (Igor Juanikorena, Mikel Sarasola and myself).
Photo: Alex Keller
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Photo: A.K.
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Saturday October 2, 48 best kayakers were going to compete (individually on a head to head eliminatory heats) at the quarterfinals on the well-known class V Wellebrucke section of the Oetz river. We passed 26 to the semi-finals where with 1 minute 8 seconds time I made it to the Top 15 Super Final as the 13th! Awesome!
Photo: A.K.
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Television was there, interviews going on, broadcasting alive in internet, and me with broken wetsuit, broken dry top and old material surrounded by all these pro shiny kayakers.
There was some misunderstanding about which country I was representing to, so I took another redbull and went to talk to the main reporter, the legendary Steve Fisher. I explain him that I am Basque, he understood, I tied the basque flag (Ikurriña) to my shoulder and I went to the start slide to race for the last time in this event.
Last drop of the race called “The Champion´s killer”. Photo: L.M.
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I went to give it all, very fast the first half course, but I went out of line on the core section and again on the champion’s killer last drop. I did a bad run but I was super happy for being the 15th at the Extreme Kayak World Championship.
Photo: L.M.
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Sam Sutton, my young friend from New Zealand 2005 chapter, became the world champion with absolute style. We met again with friends from the planet (Silvio Gurrieri, Nils Heine, Mike Dawson…) and made many more.
RIVER FRIENDS
It is possible to see all the superfinal event at freecaster.tv
http://freecaster.tv/kayak/1012959/adidas-sickline-2010-replay
http://freecaster.tv/kayak/1013326/adidas-sickline-2010-highlight
http://freecaster.tv/kayak/1012959/adidas-sickline-2010-replay
http://freecaster.tv/kayak/1013326/adidas-sickline-2010-highlight
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