Every other year, paddlers from all over the Europe gather to compete for the title of European Freestyle Champion. This year, the event was held at the well-known kayak course in Danube, Cunovo near the beautiful capital of Slovakia – Bratislava. This is the first time Slovakia have ever hosted such a big Freestyle event, but they’d already had plenty of experience in running similar competitions. The Slovakian championships, which form part of a few big competitions, have been held here over the past few years. The other events include CNAWR (Czech Federation of Freestyle & Whitewater Cup), ARFC (Alpine Rivers Freestyle Cup) and the Euro Cup. The championship was well planned and everything appeared to run very smoothly.
The kayak course itself has 3 channels – a section of flatwater used for warming up, and two main whitewater channels. The left one is mostly used for Slalom competition – the right one is used for freestyle, Rafting and kayak coaching. The flexibility of this course is fantastic, allowing it to host major events in all of these sports. Aside from hosting the Freestyle European Championships, it has played host to the Slovak Open – which was part of ICF World Cups in Slalom and also National Slovak Championships. The organisers did a great job in getting all the events to run on time and without any major hitches. This was all possible thanks to wonderful area around the course – with enough camping for competitors and supporters. For those needing more luxury, there was a hotel just next to the course. The course is only 20 km from the beautiful city of Bratislava where you can find many monuments and beautiful views so apart from competing athletes had a great opportunity to explore the city.
We arrived on Tuesday – a week before official the training was to start. Unsurprisingly, we weren’t the first! The main wave was already busy for most of the day with paddlers working tirelessly on their routines to ensure they put in a good performance on the day. The main hole looks quite small and irregular but it actually requires a lot of power and dynamic paddle strokes to throw the moves. It was specially designed to make long combo moves possible but the competitors were finding it hard to get huge air off the wave, which needed a lot of strength in order to get the best ride. Cunovo is known for being a very windy place and as it's quite exposed over the Danube River. The weather forecast wasn't looking good for the competition week with a lot of wind and rain. Luckily everyone was so fired up and excited that it didn’t serve to dampen spirits! By the time the official training started on Monday, everyone had arrived. This year we had 131 participants from 15 countries which is almost 1/3 more competitors than at previous Europeans! Even more exciting is the fact is that there have been over 30 junior men which brings hope that the sport will see great things in the next few years with so many youngsters moving up! So on Monday we were split into 9 groups, with each competitor allowed 5 minutes of training. This meant the competitors could adjust their training and everybody had a chance to get equal time in a feature. As well as this, early morning and late evening sessions gave 2 extra hours of open training for those who arrived late.
On Wednesday evening we had a great opening ceremony with officials welcoming all the athletes to Cunovo as well as a superb performance by a dance group from Slovakia. The event started the next day and the organisers cheered everyone up by delivering some much brighter weather! The first category starting was K1M where 41 men fought to make their way through to the top 20. The bar was set pretty high and to get into the quarterfinals, 570 points were needed. Next up, in the women’s heats, 14 paddlers were eliminated leaving just 10 girls to battle it out. There were no surprises in either category, all the paddlers who were expected to continue made it to the next rounds. The rest of the day was filled with K1JM, K1JW and C1. It was very long day in hot sun but a great way to start the event! The next day was probably the most closely fought battle outside the final.
We had K1M quarterfinals with some great performances by the top 20 men in Europe. It was my favourite part of the event; paddlers got 3 rides and the total of the 2 best scores count for their final score. Here, we started to see some surprises with the entire German and Austrian teams both being eliminated– particularly Marcel Bloder who had trained hard. James Weight, previously ranked 5th at the Europeans was also knocked out.
After this the last prelims of squirt were held and in the afternoon it was time for the semi-finals. In this tough part of the competition 10 paddlers take 2 runs and the best one counts. It's a hard round with competitors battling for 5 places in the final. C1 went smoothly, mainly dominated by Lucas Cervinka, as did the junior women’s event with Nouria Fontane evidently miles ahead of other juniors. In the junior men’s event, Fabien Lanao was knocked out and Honza Havelka got through. In the women’s event, Marlene Devillez and Nina Csonkova were occupying the top spots. K1M prelims were enjoyable and surprising- probably the biggest surprise was Sebastien Devred not making the final cut after winning the prelims. The most startling part of this round was that Peter Csonka scored 1823 points after his ridiculously good run. This is certainly the biggest score ever in ECA/ICF event.
Saturday was finals day for all classes, with only the best remaining. Despite the fact that weather got quite depressing and a little bit rainy – the crowd didn’t give up and came to watch the finals show. To warm up we had the squirt finals which were held at the end of Slalom course so the squirt boaters could show us their mystery moves. In K1SW Anna Orlova (RUS) won after dominating the rest of girls’ field, 2nd was young Jennifer McGaley (GBR) and 3rd Zosia Tuła(POL). In K1SM it was very tight between Alex Edwards, Ben Aldred and Max Karlsson. In the end Benjamin (GBR) came 3rd despite his amazing flatwater routine, Max (SWE) took 2nd and Alex (GBR) won with his amazing full head under mystery moves. In K1JW Nouria Fontane Maso (ESP) kept her 1st place title, Kimberlee Aldred (GBR) took 2nd and Emma Shuck (GER) was 3rd after a close fight. In K1JM there was a great show and a huge surprise as Thomas Richard (FRA) – silver medalist from last World Championships got beaten by Honza Havelka (CZE) who took bronze. Silver went to Lane De Meulenaere (BEL) and favourite Max Karlsson (SWE) took gold. After a short break we were back and ready for battle to commence.
In C1 it was a hard fight, as Lucas Cervinka (CZE) really wanted to get his 3rd European Champion title and Sebastien Devred (FRA) wanted to redeem himself after not getting into men’s final. In the end Lucas won gold, Sebastien silver and bronze went to Adria Bosch Roca (ESP). In the K1W class it was very exciting as after first runs Nina Csonkova (SVK) was sitting in last place with Marlene already taking the lead. It was all to play for in the final run where Nina had a great run, taking 2nd place, while Marlene Devillez (FRA) took gold for the 3rd consecutive time and the bronze medal went to Zofia Tuła (POL) for the first time. Last, but by no means least, the K1M competitors put on a great show. James Bebington (GBR) was the first one to cross 1000 pts and scored 1146,7 in first run putting him in the lead- but not for long! Local paddler and favourite – Peter Csonka put in a great response scoring 1490 and taking the lead. Sitting in 3rd place was Joaquim Fontane (ESP), but after the 2nd round Mathieu Dumoulin(FRA) scored 953,33 putting him in 3rd position. Emotions were running high for the last run, Joaquim went all out and pulled out a score of 1300 pts putting him in 2nd place, pushing Mathieu off the podium and nudging James down to 3rd place! Final scores were put Peter Csonka (SVK) 1st, Joaquim Fontane Maso(ESP) 2nd and James Bebington (GBR) 3rd. That evening, the closing ceremony and medal presentation ceremony were held near the course.
It was fantastic to take a part in the event and to see how much progress is being made by competitors and the sport as a whole. The best part for me was to see youngsters being inspired by the performances– it was great to see such a large number of juniors competing for the first time. It just proves how much potential and support freestyle has at the moment. I would like to thank everybody who made it happen – the organising team, judges and head judge Peter Hamer who looked after them, Peter Csonka for taking big part in organising the event and especially all paddlers and spectactors for coming and taking a part in such a great event. I’m looking forward to the next one already!
