The event just celebrated its jubilee year (5th edition) and welcomed Karel Tresnak jr (Hawaii), Oscar and Herman Chalupski (South Africa) to its great location, Surfers Paradise beach, Knokke-Heist, Belgium. Both great ‘champions’ gave away very successful free clinics where European paddlers asked loads of specific questions. Be aware they will be stepping up their game…On Saturday, 80 canoes came to race in brutal, cold, rainy and windy conditions (force 6). Very unusual for July indeed. Jumpers in a OC-event are never a good sign..
Again, Belgium welcomed a lot of nationalities. (crazy) Swedes, Italians, Bulgarians, Canadians, Brits, Germans, Dutch, New Zealanders, Australians, French, etc..
The 20km Surfski race was won by Herman Chalupski, second came Oscar. Karel Tresnak Jr finished the race in the outrigger canoe division 11 minutes before Martin Buday from Germany. On Sunday, conditions were perfect for a sprint.
Karel had a hard time (Belgium’s notorious nightlife) & looked pale white at time. Still tasting his ‘delicious’ vodka red bulls, he achieved the impossible..winning with pure class in the final heat. Gunnar Lars (Germany) ended Third Overall, Martin Buday (Germany) second.
Some dedicated paddlers are travelling for thousands of miles every year to come to Knokke. Some of them got rewarded finally. In the Master Class (+40), Claudio Bazinni from Italy showed the example closely followed by Brian Denholm (GB) and Polchow Steffen (Germany)
In this very first ‘Surf Ski World serie’ race in Europe, Le Roux Benoit (France) impressed everyone. He won a ‘Allwave’ surfski and took home 500 Euro’s. He was also guaranteed a ticket for the world cup in Dubai. Eric Verduyckt was Belgians first overall ranked paddler and was guaranteed a spot in Dubai Shamaal also.
Europe’s hard core OC woman Steraj Sandra (Italy) won just ahead of Cordes Carola (Germany). The race was ‘live’ on the internet. The NOCC is slowly but steadily growing. Its future looks guaranteed !
The NOCC was sponsored by Peak Performance, Outriggercanoe.de, and Allwave canoes.
See you next year !
www,nocc.be
Submitted by DHOOGHEDANNY on Mon, 09/15/2008 - 1:55am
If I had to go get drunk everytime I did a canoe race , I`d be in the boneyard by now.....
Jr, Oscar , I don`t know how you guys do it.....
Maybe I better start drinking more to become a better paddler?
We know goto
s a good paddler and hes a chicken soup , early to bed kind of guy who likes to wear small t shirts....#1 Mon, 09/15/2008 - 2:49am