Marathon World Cup 2 in Crestuma,
Marathon World Cup 2 in Crestuma, Portugal provided the venue for the GB team’s last major test before the 2008 World Championships. Our young team, containing none of GB’s 2007 world championship medallists, put down a strong performance by bringing home a silver and two bronze medals.
ICF marathons now use a standardised course, over 4.3km laps with a portage on each. Juniors race five laps, Women and Canoes six, and Men’s Kayaks seven. Crestuma offers a couple of unusual challenges – rough water conditions and a very hard portage. Past years have seen plenty of sinkings and capsizes, and this year was no exception.
First off on Saturday were our junior men’s K1s Mark Childerstone and Matt Welch of Wey KC, and Daniel Barber of Elmbridge. All three broke away in the front group, along with three from the strong Spanish team. Daniel lost contact after three portages, but worked hard to finish less than a minute out of the medals in 6th place. Mark and Matt stayed in contention until the final lap, where two Spaniards broke away for first and second. Mark secured the bronze medal, with Matt just behind the third Spanish paddler in fifth.
Jenna Hawkey of Hayle CC was our only representative in Women’s K1, racing a world class field. Jenna’s first lap proved to be a disaster, as she capsized after catching her paddle under another boat in choppy conditions. Jenna recovered well, pulling past three Spanish and a Portuguese to finish sixth out of eleven. Multiple world champion Vivian Follath won, ahead of Australian Lani Belcher.
The Men’s K1 was missing Spanish world champions Manuel Busto and Emilio Merchan, but the field was no less impressive for it. Stuart Hastings of Royal, dominant in this season’s assessment races, was competing in his first World Cup as a senior, after winning silver at the Worlds as a junior in 2006. Simon Fennemore of Wey joined him, fresh from ninth place at the first World Cup event in Brandenburg.
Stuart made the front group into the first turn, with Simon just behind. Both were then swamped by waves struggling into the portage behind the front group. Stuart continued to take on water with a broken footpump, eventually finishing seventeenth behind winner Anthony Stott of South Africa. Simon paddled strongly in the final few laps, recovering to tenth place.
In the junior doubles on Sunday, we again had Childerstone and Barber racing in K2, along with Welch and Wey KC’s Mike Lambert. Mike had been nursing an injury for a couple of weeks, and after leading the group around the first lap, he and Matt were forced to retire. Mark and Daniel stayed in the first group, with strong Hungarian and Spanish boats. Some strong tactics and portaging kept them there, but they were narrowly beaten into the bronze medal position.
In the junior ladies’ K2, Amelia Churnside and Jess Collins of Reading CC were racing in their first marathon world cup, while the U16 crew of Hazel Childerstone and Victoria Croucher had already won a bronze medal at the Brandenburg race. Hazel and Vicky have made a great impression this season, dominating older and stronger crews with their tactics and endurance. Halfway through the race, this looked to have secured them a medal, as Amelia and Jess lost touch with the front group after capsizing at the portage. However, Jess and Amelia chased hard and caught up, eventually claiming an excellent silver medal behind the Spanish. Vicky and Hazel were finally overhauled by the Czech girls, coming home in fourth.
Our senior ladies K2 of Harriet Farish and Nicky Taylor started while suffering from the effects of a dodgy lunch the previous day. This looked to have been too much after the first lap, with our crew lying last of the seven crews. But Harriet and Nicky showed the same determination as their team-mates, paddling through the field in the second half to a fine fourth place.
The final race of the weekend was the senior men’s K2, featuring reigning world K1 champion Merchan, and K2 silver medallist Attila Jambor of Hungary. This was a real crowd pleaser, with nine boats coming into the first portage in the front group, including Tim Pendle of Norwich CC and Jon Simmons of Wey. The portage broke the group up, but Tim and Jon settled into a group with a local Portuguese crew, some French, Spanish and Italians. They continued to chase the group containing the third and fourth placed crews throughout, to claim an impressive sixth place.
With the trailer loaded, Dyson and Ali Pendle started the long drive back to the UK, while Roland Lawler, James Smythe and team physio Becky Schofield took the team back to Porto airport for a late flight home. Congratulations to the whole team, who raced impressively, and thanks to the team management, including David Enoch who arranged race entries, transport and accommodation.
James Smythe, Team Manager