Kiwi C1’s make history in teams event.

K1 Mens final, World Champion Stefano Cipressi (Italy), 2nd Julien Billaut (France), 3rd Campbell Walsh (Great Britain)

C1 teams was won by Germany 1st, Czech Republic 2nd and Great Britain 3rd

5/8/06

It was teams runs for us C1 boys today. It is the first time New Zealand has sent a C1 teams to the World Champs in the history of slalom racing. We were off to a good start in first runs until Hamish had a couple of recuirks and James passed him. James and I then weaved the course together at a very fast pace and were going really well. However at gate 18 we both lost our rails and I did a roll and got a 50 and James had a spin and surfed the whole. This wasn’t the best start for us. Our second run was much improved where we got down the course reasonably well. However, our mistakes in our first run did not allow us to make the top 10. We came an overall 15th place in this teams event. Germany was 1st, and Great Britain 3rd.

It was an exciting K1mens final this afternoon. Wow, that is the most exciting race I have seen since the 2003 World Champs. The Italian who was winning after first runs, was still in the lead by gate 19, three quarters of the way down the course, but then on gate 20 an upstream he got a definite 50 (as shown on the television screen, but I guess cameras can lie) and then he may have got a 50 on the next gate as well as only got a bit of his head got through the gate in both cases. But after 20seconds or so they judges gave him a clean run, so he wins the World Champs title. Then Julian (French dude) who came second, got a definite touch, but none of the judges seemed to see it, and with the touch he would have been out of medals. CRAZY.STUFF

I am resting up now for semis tomorrow morning.

I race at 8.10pm Sunday NZ time (which is today I think). Again, if you are interested, live results for my race are available at: http://www.results.cz/live.php