Carrington still setting standard in K1 500m
Paddling Dame adds another world title
There’s still lots to learn from, like today continuously putting myself into a position where I have to rise up to the challenge Dame Lisa Carrington
It was a field day for Olympic champions at the Canoe Sprint World Championships with Dame Lisa Carrington, Ba´lint Kopasz and Shixiao Xu and Mengya Sun bagging gold in Dartmouth yesterday.
Poland’s women’s K4 team and the Spanish men’s K4 side also emerged victorious.
New Zealand’s Carrington bagged gold in the women’s K1 500 metres in 1m 58.69s with Anamarija Govorcˇinovic´ of Croatia second in 1m 59.97s.
Jule Hake of Germany finished 1.61s later to take bronze.
“We knew it was going to be a headwind all week, so I was definitely prepared, it’s just about having that mindset about how to strategically paddle into that headwind,” Carrington said after claiming her third K1 500 title.
“There’s still lots to learn from, like today continuously putting myself into a position where I have to rise up to the challenge, or take some opportunities or some learnings from it, so every moment of pressure is a great learning opportunity.”
Kopasz was the winner of the men’s K1 1000m with the Hungarian clocking 3m 38.93s to claim the title.
It was a tough one to take for Tokyo 2020 bronze medallist Fernando Pimenta of Portugal, who finished just 0.05s behind in second place. The bronze was bagged by Jacob Schopf of Germany.
“This year I felt in very good form,”
Kopasz said. “Every year I am getting a little bit stronger which is so important for the 1000, and my endurance was also strong. I felt like I was in better form for these world championships than last year.”
Tokyo 2020 gold medallists and Chinese pairing of Shixiao and Mengya were a cut above the rest in the women’s C2 500m as they cruised to gold in 2m 1.26s.
Liudmyla Luzan and Anastasiia Chetverikova brought joy for Ukraine when they grabbed silver in 2m 06s, underlining China’s dominance in the event.
Giada Bragato and Bianka Nagy of Hungary finished third in 2m 4.70s.
As expected, Karolina Naja, Anna Pulawska, Adrianna Kakol and Dominika Putto of Poland bagged the women’s K4 500m title in 1m 30.70s.
Carrington and her young Kiwi crew finished fifth in their 500m final, agonisingly close to the podium.
While Poland were clear ahead to take the win, a mere 0.6s separated second and fifth places.
In other events involving New Zealanders, Peter Cowan started the day with eighth in his Men’s VL3 A final and the K4 men were eighth in the 500m B final. Ashton Reiser was third in his K1 500m C Final and James Munro placed ninth in the K1 1000m B final. — Supplied content