My trip to Teva Mountain Games in Vail and Eporedia Active Days Piedmont Italy

Having a very busy kayak school season this spring I finally made it back to some races in June. I left Innsbruck end of May heading to Munich Airport and taking off to Vail, Colorado for the Teva Mountain Games.

The first race was the Steep Creek Championship which took place on Homestake. I had an alright first run but got pretty nervous in my second one, flipped, had to roll and finally ended in third position behind Palms Martina Wegman (NED) and Louise Jull (NZL).

Due to the low water levels the Freestyle hole on the Gore Creek in downtown Vail was shallow and tricky. Interesting to watch how current world champion Claire O´Hara (UK) was dominating the womens class, scoring 660 points in here winning ride. Also owed to the low water level the Down River Sprint Section took with a winning time of 24 minutes about 6 minutes longer than last year. It was a hard and tiring race and Martina, Lou and I made the podium again as in Homestake.

The last competition day of the Teva Mountain Games was the one which definitely attracted most visitors to the kayak events – 8-Ball kayak cross and raft cross have been on the schedule. After making it through the prelims in the 8-Ball competition, Claire and me tried to score in the raft cross as well. Unfortunately we had to race against two male US rafting team members so we were knocked out in the first round. Anyways, fun to watch the other teams fighting through the next rounds. In the afternoon I managed to make it through the semi-finals for the 8-Ball and so finally the three Kiwi girls Louise Urwin, Louise Jull, Toni Goerge and me who went into the 8-Ball finals. More and more 8-ballers showed up and it was quite hard to make a way through to the finish line. In the end it was me who crossed it first followed by Toni George and Louise Urwin. After my second participation in Vail I can summarize that I liked the Teva Mountain Games a lot. There is so much going on in Vail village – so many interesting events to watch like the bouldering world cup, the Slopestyle and Slackline competitions as well as pretty good concerts every evening. Still being stoked I left Vail the next morning and flew back to Europe, ready for the next event – the Eporedia Active Days in Piedmont, Italy.

Jetlagged as hell I made it to Val Chiusella two days later. Unfortunately the river occurred as low and bony as Gore Creek the week before in Vail. As a result the organizers moved the race section a little upstream compared to the past years, so it was a new challenge in the 2012 edition of the race to get in all the new drops. Mariann Saether (NOR) took first place followed by me and then Jenny Crimes (UK) in third position.

For the sprint race and the boater cross all kayakers moved out of the scenic Val Chiusella to the demanding race course in the beautiful town Ivrea – finally some water under my boat and incredible Italian ice-cream

The same night the men’s team sprint took place what was close contest and really worth seeing. I was able to take a first place in the individual sprint and a second in the boater x the next day what ensured the overall wining of the womens class followed by Jenny and Mariann. Congrats to Honza Lasko (CZE) who was victorious in the overall mens category followed by Sam Sutton (NZL) and Filippo Brunetti (ITA).