‘Extra’ motivation spurs champion
New Zealand’s latest world champion Danielle Mckenzie has overcome the death of her grandfather on the eve of competition to win a gold medal.
Mckenzie produced an outstanding paddle at the ICF canoe ocean racing world championships in France to bank a deserved gold medal following a dominant display in the open women’s race.
The win came two days after the passing of her grandfather Bob, who lost his battle with cancer.
‘‘He always called me his number one granddaughter and loved hearing of my accomplishments,’’ she said. ‘‘It was an extra motivation.’’
On another memorable day for New Zealand female paddling, following their recent gold medal success at the ICF canoe sprint world championships, the 2015 world champion Teneale Hatton also grabbed a podium spot to take bronze behind Mckenzie.
New Zealand maintained their ongoing medal success in the open women’s division, and have snared five of the nine medals available at the past three world championships.
Competing into a tricky sidewind on the 22km course in Saint-pierre De Quiberon, Mckenzie, an ironwoman specialist competing in only her third surfski race, dominated from the early stages to complete the race in 1:43.48 – 1min 20sec clear of the defending champion, Hayley Nixon, of South Africa.
‘‘It is pretty awesome to win against such a stacked field,’’ said Mckenzie, who was born and raised on Auckland’s North Shore but is now based in Australia.
‘‘I don’t think it has fully sunk in yet. Ski is my strongest discipline in surf lifesaving and I have wanted to do more surfski competitions.
‘‘I was heading to Durban, South Africa, for an international surf rescue event and when I saw that the world ocean racing championships were in France, and while I was over in this part of the world, I decided to give it a crack.
‘‘For the first 2km I paddled with Teneale, I was feeling really good and then just took off. I had a feeling I was leading, but it was hard to know. The open men, who started two minutes behind, caught up at 7km and I jumped on their line.
‘‘As I crossed the line all the boys were clapping and cheering me. It was a pretty awesome accomplishment to win.’’