Skip to main content

Rasdex Classic River Race 2014

Better late than never! This year I was fortunate enough to be given permission to compete at the Rasdex Classic River Race, a 70km kayak race, rather than do safety like I have in the past few years. It was good timing as well, with having just received a brand new Flow kayaks Rush to try out. Although I didn't get a chance to paddle the new boat down the river before the race, I had paddled the river several times in other boats in the weeks leading up to the event, so I knew the river like the back of my hand. To increase the excitement of getting to race again I was named as someone to watch out for in the pre race predictions. www.sportzhub.com/news/rasdex-classic-river-race3

I was (fortunate) enough to still be in the junior category so I knew there was little chance of getting any competition from other juniors, so my main goal going into the event was to try and get into the top 10 overall and not have the open men catch me who were starting 15 minutes behind me. The novices, veteran woman and open woman started before me which gave me something to focus on as I chased them down the river.



By the time I got to the top of the gorge (25km into the race), I had passed everyone who started before me except for Sophie Hart and Olivia Spencer-Bower who were having quite a battle for the win in the Open Women's category. I would catch glimpses of them every now and then but couldn't seem to pull any time back. The rest of the gorge seemed to fly by fairly easily with the Rush being amazing to paddle, feeling super fast and smooth through everything the river had to offer.


Normally by the time I reach Woodstock (55km) I feel pretty tired and struggle to push hard for the final 15km. However today I still felt fresh and apparently even had a smile on my face as I was passing through! I was now getting constant views of Sophie and Olivia in the distance so I pushed as hard as I could to try and catch them before the end. Unfortunately I didn't quite have it in me to catch them but still managed to hold off the open men like I had hoped for. I knew I had had a near perfect race and now just had to wait and see where I came in overall.



In the end, the 70km paddle took me 3:56:33 which meant I won junior men by over 26 minutes! And was a good enough time for 9th overall (8th open men if I had have stepped up). With the race having basically been an individual time trial for me, I was left wondering how much quicker I could have gone if I had have started with the Open men and had them to flow along with. Next year I will find out!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Motivation from setback

 The last time I wrote on here I was just about to go into a hand operation to sort out my dexterity issue after breaking it earlier in the year. At the time I stated I felt like I was capable of more but unfortunately may not get a chance to prove it for awhile. I never expected what the next 12 months would bring, and to be honest, despite the further injuries and setbacks, I'm not sure I would change a thing.  So what have the last 12 months involved?  A few months recovery and physio from hand surgery That classic thing called covid and its impacts And a little slip on ice resulting in fractures to my T6/7 and a seizure... It's definitely not all bad though. I'm now working as the Christchurch station manager for St John Ambulance. I've joined the committee of Arawa Canoe Club as the race coordinator. I've organised 28 kayak events with all proceeds going towards supporting juniors (and another 7 events planned between now and Christmas). I've also received ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Topsport Prologue Series #1

 With my K2 partner heading to South Africa to see family and do some racing (lucky bastard), I finally lined up at a major race as a solo competitor. With hand surgery in a couple of weeks potentially wiping out the next few months of races, I wasn't sure whether I'd even bother to enter this race but the racing bug bit hard!  While it was a warm morning, the wind was blowing hard! It was enough to make me slightly concerned about parts of the course, so I felt pretty bad for the novices, they were certainly in for a wake up call on what the Waimak can be like on race day! In the wind storm that was the 2011 Coast to Coast, I had managed to get to Woodstock dry, before swimming many many times in this final 15km due to the wind. There's really only two strategies for wind, paddle at the speed of it (or faster) so it doesn't impact you, or be at the heavier end of the scale so it doesn't affect you as badly. Unfortunately most of the time both of these strategies ar...
1 comment
Read more

Twizel Sprints

While my long term goal in the boat is definitely at the endurance end of the scale, a wise Brazilian by the name of Flavio once told me the only way to be fast in a marathon, is to be fast in a 10km, and the only way to be fast in a 10km, is to be fast in a 1km.  And so here I found myself, at the tail end of a big block of paddling, definitely noticing some fatigue after 3 hours of paddling the day before, and lining up against the future of sprint paddling in Canterbury and Otago. My expectations were pretty low, I was very much just there for the experience so I was pleasantly surprised to come away with 4th A final in the K1 200m. With my training being focused towards endurance, I had expected this to be my worst event of the day since it is aimed at explosive power and high speed. Surprisingly (or perhaps not with my level of fatigue), the shortest race of the day was also my best. In all of the following events I would reach the 250m mark and reach my limit in pace, watchin...
Post a Comment
Read more