FLATTACH - BEAUTIFUL SETTING, CONGRATULATIONS IN ORDER

Fantastic setting for our next phase of the tour, beautiful Flattach in Austria.  Here our crew were competing in the next ECA Junior Cup.   Flattach is a wonderful natural course, nestled in the snow-capped Austrian Alps.  A sense of lower course Kawerau / Tekapo...  Deceptively simple course, with a few tricky challenges thrown in for good measure.

Some great results for the kiwi contingent.  Special congratulations to George Snook, who won GOLD in the K1 Men U16.  And to Casey Hales, who scored a BRONZE in the K1 Women U18.

This event was run by a small family group of Austrians with a long history in slalom.  Gerard, Doris and the team did a wonderful job in organising the event...

Very happy to meet up again with the Bells, the Rayners, and Hales/Bostons.  Our support team did an great job in helping our athletes - creating gastronomic masterpieces (on a limited budget), providing moral support, and lending a hand in judging the races!

We were also pleased to meet the parents of our esteemed junior coach, Bertrand.  Jose and Francine Guterriez were embraced into the kiwi fold...

And we were also very happy to meet Miro Matejka again (one of our 2017 tour coaches).  He helped admirably with coaching with Bertrand heading off on the last day on best man duties in France.

ECA JUNIOR CUP - AUGSBURG RACE DAY - SAT 23 JUN

Sat 24th June 2018

So, 19 nations, 72 clubs, some 365 young athletes testing their skills in the 2018 ECA Junior Canoe Slalom Cup Series.  Each day of the 24th and 25th of June are separate races in the series; a qualification run held in the morning, followed by a final which captures to top 2/3 of the qualification rounds (30 max for K1M and 20 max for K1M).

The course was deceptively simple, to which one athlete remarked, "these courses are sometimes the hardest".  And so it proved to be.  A number of paddlers, despite posting fast times for their runs, incurred some 50 point penalties on the first / second gates.

Overall though, it was a great day for some of our New Zealand athletes, some top 10 final results being:

C1MU18 - Jack Egan - 6th (+11.21)

C1MU18 - Charlie Bell - 10th (+22.00)

K1WU16 - River Mutton - 9th (+23.05)

K1MU16 - George Snook - 3rd (+2.7)

K1MU18 - Zack Mutton - 7th (+4.00)

Full results: www.akv-online.de

NEUSCHWANSTEIN CASTLE

Thursday 22nd June

After training today, the team enjoyed an excursion to the beautiful Neuschwanstein Castle, about
1 & 3/4 hours drive from downtown Ausgburg - magnificent scenery ... Here's a link:  http://www.neuschwanstein.de/englisch/palace/

WORKING HARD, AND HAVING FUN...

Pizza so good, we went there twice!

The team have been training every day on the water in Augsburg - one or sometimes two sessions.  Whitewater, flatwater, trx, all interspersed with having some other fun!

Explaining the finer points of the edge...

World Cup Draw (Soccer that is...)

Hard out studying, Mum and Dad...

10 push ups per minute late... they only had to do 10!

Picturesque downtown Augsburg

Who needs flash toys, hours of entertainment... landing the water bottle up the right way.

TRX training - anytime, anywhere.

DACHAU

Augsburg is only half an hour from Dachau Concentration Memorial Site, and well worth a visit for us to learn more about a dark time in history.  A sobering and enlightening experience.  https://www.kz-gedenkstaette-dachau.de/virtual_tour.html

IN THE SWING OF IT - AUGSBURG

So Patrick, Finn, Courtney, Hannah and Shaun have headed further afield, to train and compete in World Cups, leaving the junior team to train for the ECA Junior Slalom Cup event in Augsburg to be held on Saturday 24 June, and Sunday 25 June.  Here's a link to the series for U18 athletes: http://www.ecajuniorslalomcup.eu/  After this event, we'll be moving on to the event in Flattach, Austria, held Tuesday 27 June, and Wednesday 28 June, as part of our training programme for the Junior U18 competition, to be held in Ivrea, Italy.

The team are all pitching in with meal preparation, and cooking, and competed in a "MasterChef" competition, Girls vs. Boys.  This time around, the girls won.

Team Managers, Jeanette and Kerry, and Master Coach, Bertrand competed the following night with a salmon pasta vs. chicken pasta cook-off, followed by a superb fruit salad.  It was a tie.

And the winners are....  The Girls, by a whisker.

Jack, a bit disappointed with the buns.

"Mean as" Lasagne, slightly crispy on the bottom. (Superb effort, given it was cooked in a frypan)

AMAZING AUGSBURG!

The team have enjoyed some pretty special days, getting used to boats, and the course that is Augsburg's Eiskanal.  This course was the first artificial whitewater course in the world, built for the 1972 Munich Olympic Games (Munich is less than an hour down the road).  It is set in beautiful parklike grounds.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augsburg_Eiskanal

EUROPE, HERE WE COME!

Sunday 10 June...
Hard to believe that in a few short hours (well, 35 hours) we would be landing in beautiful Italy to start the adventure that is the 2018 Canoe Slalom NZ U18 & U23 World Championship Tour.

Casey, Rivey, Patrick, Stewart, Damian, Jack E, Charlie, Lotte, Kerry, Jeanette and Team Bell (Mike, Kathy, and Joy) boarded in chilly NZ, and winged our way to summer in Milan.  The team then drove through the stunning Swiss Alps on the 5 hour trip up to Augsburg, Germany to meet up with Finn and Courtney.  Many of the crew spent some time setting up brand new boats, busy christening them on the Awesome Augsburg Eiskanal.

 Looking forward to meeting up with the balance of the crew down the track: Jack D, Callum G, Zack, James and George.