The Australian Senior Canoe Sprint Team will compete in the third and final World Cup in Szeged, Hungary this weekend before returning home for final preparations for August’s World Championships in Canada.
With Hungary considered the Meccaof the sport, the Szeged World Cup will see more than 50 countries competing and with two entries per nation allowed, many events can be more competitive than a World Championship race.
The Australian team like many other countries competing will be using this event as their final selection race for the World Championships Team.
Lisa Russ (Hilton) and Alana Nicholls (Dianella) will be in Australia’s K4 500m crew with Hannah Davis (SASI) and Lyndsie Fogarty (QAS) who with Russ are the surviving members of the Bronze medal winning crew from Beijing last year.
Nicholls and Russ will also be racing off against National Champions and Olympic sixth place finishers Davis and Fogarty in the K2 500m with the wining crew gaining the berth for that event at Worlds. Nicholls will also test her speed against the World’s best in the K1 200m.
Reece Baker (Marmion) – who from reports has been in career best form in training in Europe – will be a key player in the men’s K4 1000m crew that will look to emulate their surprise fifth place from the first World Cup in the Czech Republic early last month.
Jesse Phillips (Nollamara) will be Australia’s other competitor alongside Olympic Champion Ken Wallace in the K1 1000m and will also line up in the K1 200m and will pair up with SASI speedster Matt Goble in the K2 200m.
Daniel Bowker (Kingsley) will depart this weekend as a member of the Australian Under 23 team that will compete in the international Under 23 regattas in Germany and Poland over the next few weeks.
WAIS Head Coach Ramon Andersson said, “Daniel has continued his impressive improvement since being selected in this team in March with some nice technical changes and is really looking forward to competing for Australia in his first overseas trip.”
Locally, Brendon Sarson (Balcatta) will start equal favourite with Brendan Rice in the State Marathon Championships on the Canning River this weekend and with the pair also teaming up for the K2 event, they will be the hot favourites to take that out that event.
