On finals day the European athletes really shone! Winning all kayak classes (only C1 & Oc1 went to USA).
In the Junior Men’s Palm’s Bren Orton dominated as expected to take the win. He won in the first round with a ride that would be unbeatable by the others and then beat his own score with a 1066 in his 2nd ride. Hunter Katt from the USA did come close with a 950 to take 2nd place scoring huge almost on every move.
In the Junior Women’s Catalonia’s Nuria Fontane took 1st again with Germany’s Julia Spaaij in 2nd and USA’s Lauren Burress in 3rd.
In the Women’s Claire O’hara of GBR showed some real consistency to pull off two over 500 points rides. None of the other girls could beat her winning first ride of 586. Emily Jackson got 2nd with Nina Csonkova in 3rd
In Men’s it was an expected battle between Peter Csonka and Dane Jackson. After 2nd rides Dane had taken the lead with a 1373 point ride that looked like it would seal the win but then Peter fought back with an astonishing 1416 going for every move possible in the hole pretty much. Dane as the winner of the semi’s had the last attempt to beat Peters score and came very close with a 1380 but not quite enough. Peter was 1st, Dane 2nd and Quim took a well deserved 3rd place.
I just couldn’t push properly on my right side and finished 5th, I was mostly happy even be in the finals given my collarbone injury. I got an alright first ride of 916 but I hadn’t recovered enough from the previous rounds to compete properly this time.
Results below:
Men’s Results
Women’s Results
Junior Women’s Results
Junior Men’s Results
C1 Results
OC1 Results
Pringle
This was the toughest day of the event for the men with both Quarterfinals and Semi finals in the same day.
It was tough to make top 10, the cut was about 1800 for 2 rides, which is much higher than Worlds was 1 year ago…but for the top 5 it was even harder. We have pretty much all the same competitors as in Worlds but now Dane and Quim are seniors too. Also Tomas Andrassy from Slovakia, Bartosz and Tomasz from Poland have all became a very strong competitors and are paddling on a top level too.
There are now more than 5 paddlers capable of pulling off an over 1000points ride here.
The hardest thing for me is balancing between scoring a good ride but not pushing too hard on my broken bone 
I came in 8th in the morning, feeling very pleased to make the semi finals. Peter just stole the top spot from Dane again closely followed by Quim.
In the Semi finals we all knew it was going to be a ride of over a 1000 needed at least to make Finals. This time Dane had one of the sickest rides I’ve ever seen (1350) to get 1st ahead of Peter who was 2nd, Quim 3rd, Stephen 4th and myself 5th with 1066points!!!
European contingent is looking strong, with 3 paddlers making the finals. Now its one day off to recover and rest before its time to really throw down properly on Saturday 
Results: - http://www.freestylekayaking2013.com/pdfs/results/MensSemiFinalsResultsPigeon.pdf
In the Junior Men’s, Bren had rides in prelims that would have put him 3rd in the Men’s and almost two times ahead of the other Juniors… he looked on fire, getting two trophy moves in his ride even.
Today he was up again in the Semi’s and as expected easily won with 1053 in one ride with USA’s Hunter Katich going very big to get 700points and 2nd place. Also making the finals was GBR’s Brandon Hepburn in 4th place.
Results: - http://www.freestylekayaking2013.com/pdfs/results/JuniorMensK1semiResultsPigeon.pdf
In the Women’s Prelims Katya did very good making the cut for the Semi finals. Claire O’Hara from GBR got 1st in the prelims followed by Ruth Gordon, Nina Csonkova and Emily Jackson.
Results:- http://www.freestylekayaking2013.com/pdfs/results/WomensK1prelimResultsPigeon.pdf
Semi Finals was today and Claire O’hara was looking strong, taking the 1st place again! Katya did very good rides with Entry moves, Phonics and a Loops, everyone was pretty sure she would make the cut but judges thought differently so she ended up 7th missing the cut by 30 points.
Results: - http://www.freestylekayaking2013.com/pdfs/results/WomensK1SemiResultsPigeon.pdf
We’re both happy with how we did today and ready for a rest day tomorrow, as it’s no water releasing. It’s such a good feature here, one of the best holes we’ve ever paddled, finals should be very interesting. I’m really hoping to recover a bit and be able to show my best.
Finals TV will be streamed live from:- http://www.ustream.tv/channel/h2o
Pringle
