Well we just finished up the Canadian National Championships and Canadian Team trials for Freestyle Kayaking.
For me it all started a week before when I first visited Valleyfield, Quebec, the hosting city for the Championships. I was beyond impressed with the man made course build in the middle of the city. I couldn’t believe that this place existed only 3 hours from where I grew up and I had barely heard of it, and never visited before. The whitewater park itself was a great combination of olympic friendly slalom course with a fun and challenging freestyle feature smack dab in the middle.
The feature itself was quite good, but challenging in the fact that it was so powerful and flushy, making it hard to stick a multitude of tricks before washing out the back of the hole. After a couple days of practice I started to figure out the hole a bit better and started feeling a little more prepared for this quickly approaching National Championships.
It was long before the weekday became the weekend and the event started off. Saturday was the Prelims, and Semi-finals rounds, and Sunday held the finals and crowned the new National Champions. I felt good with my rides on Saturday, winning both the Prelims and Semi in Men’s K1, as well as continuing on to Sunday and making the finals in the C-1 class too. Sunday came bringing sunshine and spectators, as we battled out to crown a multitude of National Champions in the several classes. First up Sunday morning was the Junior classes, with Sam Duff taking 1st in Jr. Mens and Savannah Westeinde taking 1st for the Jr. Women’s class. Next was my first class the C-1 class. This was more for fun for me, being I usually don’t compete in this disciple of Canoe class. I ended up in 5th in C-1 and was really happy to have tried it and completing my ride, while Zachary Zwanenburg took home National Champion in C-1. Following the C-1 class was the OC-1 which is more traditional canoe style with an open cockpit. Zach Zwanenburg also took home another first place in OC-1 after breaking a tie for first with Andy Hill. The Pro women followed with some amazing tricks and some disappointing finishes, though Cheryl McGregor was more then excited as she took her first National Champion title and won a spot of the Canadian Team for 2017. The Pro Men’s class rounded off the event with some spectacular moves, and all around good rides from all the finalists. I ended taking home another gold and National Champion title for myself, and I couldn’t have been happier.
After all the dust settled, and the sweat and tears dried up, what was left was some newly crowned National Champions and a strong field of competitors that will proudly represent Canada in Rio for the 2017 Freestyle Kayak World Championships.
Time to switch gears and focus on the next chapter in life, and see you all in Brazil next year!
Nick Troutman
