WAIS Slalom Pair Tune Up for London at World Cup 2
With less than seven weeks til the 2012 Olympic Games, AIS-WAIS slalom canoe athletes Kynan Maley and Robin Jeffery will get the opportunity to compete at the ICF Slalom World Cup 2 event in Pau, France from June 15-17.
For the first time this year, Australia’s four canoe slalom Olympic athletes; Kynan Maley, Warwick Draper, Robin Jeffery and Jessica Fox, and the remainder of the senior slalom team will compete as one at the second ICF World Cup in Pau, France, with racing getting underway on Friday afternoon.
“The team has been altogether for the first time this tour yesterday in Pau,” said Australian Head Coach Mike Druce.
“We are really working on a delivery in the competition this weekend; it’s not so much about practising the specific skills for this course, much more about practising racing.”
The men’s C1, Men’s K1 and women’s C1 heats will kick off the action on Friday afternoon, with London bound duo Warwick Draper and Kynan Maley set to commence their preparations for the Games, with their first competitive hit out of the World Cup Series so far.
Maley bypassed the first World Cup in Cardiff last week in favour of an additional training period alongside C2 partner Robin Jeffery, and K1 paddler Draper who will benefit from the additional days training on the course.
Maley is looking forward to racing, “I can’t wait to race the Pau world cup this week. The whitewater in Pau feels a lot like a steep natural river and really suits the way I paddle, so I am looking for a good result,” said Maley.
Joining Maley in the men’s C1 event will be 22 year old Ian Borrows who will look to build on his 27th finish at the first World Cup a week ago, while Draper will join New South Wales duo Lucien Delfour and Will Forsythe in the men’s K1 event.
After a stunning one-two finish in the women’s C1 event in Cardiff last Saturday, NSWIS duo Ros Lawrence and Jessica Fox are will be looking to produce cleaner runs this week after receiving more gates touches than they would have liked last weekend.
“I was pretty happy with my overall performance at World Cup 1. My C1 run had a couple of mistakes that were a bit disappointing, but the rest of it was the way I want to paddle and I managed to hold the run together despite the challenging water,” said Lawrence.
“In C1 I made too many costly mistakes in the final and I think I definitely need to clean up the run without all those touches,” said Fox.
– Canoeing Australia