World Champs without Basque Country (eng)

     @euskara (in basque language)

"Sickline" Extreme Kayak World Championship will be next 7th Oct 2012 and for the second year they don't let me compete as basque.

    2010 was the only time I participate there and for that the condition was to respect my basque being. They let me compete representing my basque nation and for everybody's surprise I made it to the finals finishing 15th, appearing on TV and on internet.

     My 2010 Sickline report.

     Looks like someone didn't like that and since that I'm not allowed to represent the Basque Country.

     With this in mind my personal decision has been to NOT participate on the world champs, because I don't want to defend the colours of the spanish and french governments that have made that much damage to the basque people. I have very good friends in Spain and in France, however I ask to respect each person's being.

     On sport championships the organizers decide if the competitors will represent nations or states/countries. Still nowadays the Basque Country (Euskal Herria) is not a state but it is a recognized nation. Hope all our athletes will represent their colours soon...

     Meantime I wish all the best to my kayaker friends on the world champs, and for the organizers too.

     One of the organizers that closed me the way to the champs, Kim-Joo, told me: "We wish you all the best in your kayaking career."  To be a sportman and happy I don't need to compete. Even if I'm not allowed to participate on the world champs the good luck always has been my buddy keeping me alive, and hope I continue being a lucky man.     Next stop: Asia.

15th on the World Champs. Sickline 2010 (eng)

@euskara                                          @hispano

EXTREME KAYAK WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP 2010 ADIDAS-SICKLINE, AUSTRIA   2010-9-30/2010-10-2 RIVER SECTION DIFFICULTY Oetz (Austrian Alps) Wellebrucke V

15th OF THE WORLD!

Photo: Laura Mas

     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

     We were almost 150 competitors from all over the world for the first qualification run. 90 kayakers passed to the second qualification run and for the surprise of everybody, including me, I made the 8^th fastest time. With the overall qualification 1+2, I was going number 13 to the next day finals on the upper part of the section.

Photo: A.K.

     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 13^th! Awesome!

Photo: A.K.

     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.

      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 15^th at the Extreme Kayak World Championship.

Photo: L.M.

     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