Race Day 2

With the scorching hot day turning into a crazy electrical storm overnight we wondered what race day two would bring. Well cooler temps and threatening rain which didn't eventuate meant more comfortable racing. First up Jane and Kelly in C1W. As all go through it was great experience and standing on the river bank talking to Jean Michel Prono from the ICF, he expressed how pleased he was at the level. Kelly paddled a solid first run and a great second run to finish in 7th while Jane improved her overall performance in run two except for one move that didn't quite work leaving her in 12th. Jess Fox was 26 seconds ahead in the heats, but the real test will be on Sunday in semis with Jess as favourite. One of the Chinese looks strong as well as a Canadian girl and a British girl.
 Haven Bellamy was up next in C1M- he started well with some solid paddling but a roll at gate 13th caused some issues , however he recovered to finish well. Sitting in 40th with  30 going through he had his work cut out to make semis in his second run and unfortunately he couldn't quite pull it off.
The K1 was a tight race with 10 seconds from 1-40th, with 40 going through from the field of 72. Malcolm Gibson was off first and posted a good run with 1 touch to be in 36th after run 1. Carl Whitehead attacked the course from gate one and had  a great performance to be 16th after run1. Callum unfortunately got a 50 in the gate that caught many out- gate 15. It was a nervous wait in second runs to see who would make it and for Callum a slick, penalty free run saw his final placing at 26 or 27. Carl on 23rd  and sadly for Malcolm he missed out - that small touch in run 1 costing him a semis place.
Just had  the team leaders dinner and was surrounded at the table by many nationalities- Iran, Sth Africa, Swiss, Italy, Australia and French. Interesting and I was reluctant to go but is was good. The French guy was on the committee and said they had 250 volunteers and 30 of those were down at the course at 3am rescuing tents etc that were victims of the storm that went through. I am amazed they could get 30 people out of bed to help out at that hour.
Everything is running so smoothly and this is the best run junior worlds I have been too. The French know how to do things well. Teams races tommorrow and we have high hopes for the kiwis boys, and the girls to have a good performance.