Day one of competition in the 2013 ICF Canoe Freestyle World Championships is all wrapped up. The competition was kicked off with the highly competitive Junior Men’s class. These are the paddlers of the future, and the future is bright. The daily highlight certainly came from Hunter Katich of the United States. Hunter laid down an impressive 1,133 point ride on his first ride of the heat (the highest of the day). This ride alone put in the top 3. He finished off the heat with a ride of 846 points, giving him a final score of 1,979. When asked about his secret to success Hunter said, “I just try to stay calm. I just hope I can keep it up.” Max Karlsson (SWE) inched past Alec Voorhees (USA) for the second place spot, their scores we’re 1,206 and 1,204, respectively.
The top 10 from the Jr. Men will continue on to semi-finals, Saturday afternoon. Download the results PDF: OFFICIAL PRELIM K-1 Junior Men Results
The kayaking action took a short break between Jr. Men’s heats to give way for a crowd pleasing event, the Mini-Me Raft Rodeo. Spectators joined in the action for their own chance to surf the 2013 wave in Mini-Me rafts. There will be numerous ways to join in the action each day. Check out the event schedule for ways that you can participate this week.
The day of competing came to a close with the semi-finals for the OC-1 class. OC-1 is open canoe, paddlers sit on the knee’s and use a canoe paddle. Only having one paddle blade, and a boat that fills with water as paddlers take their ride makes this an incredibly difficult class to compete in. The U.S. team had another strong showing taking the top two spots. Jordan Poffenberger paddled smart, posting a solid 93 point ride his first ride, and then busting out the big tricks in his second ride and posting a score of 203 points (the division’s highest of the day). Dane Jackson, also of the US, started off strong with a 140 point ride, but failed to post a score on his second ride of the day. Matthew Godsoe took the third place spot with a score of 50 points. The OC-1 finalist will duke it out for the gold on Sunday morning.
The top 5 advance to finals. Download the results PDF: OFFICIAL PRELIM OC-1 Men Results
The show continues on tomorrow morning with the both Men’s and Women’s Squirt classes, beginning at 11:00AM. The action takes a break at 1:00PM for the Wave Sport Wesser Falls Extreme Race.