French slalom specialists dominated Saturday’s finals in La Seu as Denis Gargaud Chanut won gold in the C1 Men’s class and Boris Neveu’s clear run secured K1 men’s success, while Jessica Fox (AUS) proved again that she’s the best woman in a C1 boat.
Last year Slovakian paddlers provided a masterclass in the C1 Men’s final dominating the podium. This year it was only Mataj Benus on the podium, but his silver medal had a taste of last year’s gold as victory was not his main goal in this Final.
“I’m actually really happy because for me, it’s not only a World Cup, it’s a lot more than that”, he said. This race counts for our Olympic selection. So finishing before the other Slovaks is good news.
Jumping into the Final before Martikan and Slafkovski, he delivered a fast and clean race, putting pressure on his compatriots. "I think I could have been much faster but I didn’t want to take risks in order to secure a good result”, he continued.
Benjamin Savsek (SLO) won the bronze medal, showing that skill owes nothing to chance at the top international level. In the last 14 races, the Slovene missed the final only twice.
But it was Denis Gargaud Chanut who claimed gold in La Seu on Saturday. The 28 year old French was feeling relaxed before the race, for the Olympic Parc Del Segre was hosting the national trials until 2009 and the course has no secret for him.
“It’s a good final, from top to bottom of the course”, he said. “I guess one could always do better, go faster, but what matters most is that I performed well on the key points I was working on: some technical parts of the course obviously, but also my mindset.”
“It’s a good result for me because I am the fourth boat in the national team. I didn’t do well at the last race of the French trials, so this kind of good results can help me for the rest of the season. “
He stressed the benefits of his decision to leave the national training centre located in Pau, where the World Cup Final will be hosted next week.
“I spent four years there to prepare the London Olympics”, said the 28 year old.
I want to become more versatile and skillful on different kind of courses. So I have been training in Marseille on a flat course and then a bit everywhere the slalom season takes me to experience all kinds of streams. I think it’s important to master other courses than your home course. - Denis Gargaud Chanut
Neveu in top shape
Samuel Hernanz knows something about it, as the K1 paddler has been a regular medalist in La Seu, claiming gold last year, even.
This time he crossed the finish line with the second fastest time of 89.61s. His nice and aggressive run was not enough however to outclass his good friend Boris Neveu (FRA), who won gold in 89.06s.
The reigning world champion delivered a perfect and controlled race, concretising two good days of competition.
“That was a really good weekend”, he said. “I was alright in the heats despite a small touch, and finished second in the semifinal. It was enough to build some confidence and attack in the final and score a great time”.
I guess being confident is really important when approaching the most important goal of the season, which is the World Championships. To qualify regularly in the final is a validation of all the hard work done during the winter season. - Boris Neveu
"Now I’ll be travelling to Pau for the World Cup final. That’s going to be a great celebration of slalom at home, in France. And then I’ll leave to Lee valley in London where the team will train to prepare the Worlds”.
The K1 Men bronze medal went to the Aussie Lucien Delfour, who achieved a career high second place in 2013 on the Spanish course and got his best result of the season so far after finishing 7th, 19th and 26th in the 3 first world cups.
“Pau and Seu are two courses I know well, and I can find my marks a lot more easily”, he said. “I was definitely hoping to paddle better on those two courses. Plus, I'm interested to see how I will do with my new boat.”
Delfour changed for a bigger boat, which he hopes will give him an advantage down the bigger water in London, the host of this year’s World Championships.
Vilarrubla's cruel disappointment
In the ever growing C1 Women event, Delfour’s compatriot and reigning world champion Jessica Fox proved again that she was a cut above the rest. Despite a mistake as early as gate 1, she managed to refocus and tore the course apart to stop the clock 7.07 seconds faster than Katerina Hoskova (CZE).
A sweet revenge after she got a 50 second penalty in Slovakia for the third stage of the 2015 ICF World Cup series.
Local favourite and fastest time in the heats and semifinal, Nuria Vilarrubla (ESP) was up to the challenge but it was her who missed a gate this time.
“Nuria Vilarrubla set a fast time in the semifinal and I knew I had to be on the line for my final run and attack more than the semi”, Fox said.
"After my first gate, which was a callous mistake, I decided to improve on all the key moves which I wasn’t so good on in the semifinal. The last section was much better and I scored a fast time so I am really happy".
As often during the season, she will now focus back on the K1 competition.
I'll try and just switch off from the C1 and maybe jump into the K1 and do a warm down in K1 to switch to my K1 brain. I will do the C1 medal presentation, put the medal away, I won’t even watch the video and watch the K1 men final instead.- Jessica Fox
After winning her first medal in Prague and missing the final in Liptovski, Katerina Hoskova (CZE) won silver. Reigning European champion Kimberley Woods (GBR) finished third despite a good race but will certainly regret her two touches in gates 17 and 21.
The action continues with two finals tomorrow in the K1 Women and C2 Men.
Watch the replay on Youtube
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