Nationals 2011
by Mike Thompson, 4/1/2012
The first week of August I went to US Canoe/Kayak Sprint Nationals with the Cascade Canoe & Kayak race team. Nationals were held in Gainesville, Georgia at the venue built for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
The Cascade juniors did very well, and our Masters team placed second to Lanier C & K, the host club.
In preparation I trained pretty hard through the winter and spring, doing ninety paddles between Halloween and Easter. That's three or four paddles each week through the Northwest's cold, wet, and dark months, which felt like some dedication. I also parted with $3K for a beautiful new carbon-fiber Nelo sprint canoe, which arrived in June. Entering my fifth year of sprint canoe paddling, I wanted to find out what was possible.
My competition at Nationals turned out to be my own coach, Dan Henderson. I finished just ahead of Dan in the Intermediate C-1 500 meters on Thursday, paddling a PR of 2:46. In the Masters C-1 500 I finished just ahead of Dan again, and we also placed one/two in the 5,000 meters distance race. Dan and I paddled together in the Masters C-2 500, and with Steve Jones and Bob Hahn in the Masters C-4 500. I also paddled a K-4 500 with Dan, Bob Hahn, and Eugene Saburi
My sweet sister, Susan flew all the way out to Georgia to watch the last two days of the regatta. Pretty cool sister, huh? She stayed with the team in our hotel, sweltered with us in the 90-degree-plus heat and humidity during the day, and attended the awards banquet.
When it was over we loaded all the boats on the trailer and headed for the Atlanta airport, while Dan began his long cross-country drive back to Seattle.
It was really neat to spend a whole week doing nothing but paddling: thinking about your next race, warming up and stretching, getting your gear ready, paddling up to the start line, getting the boat down the course as fast as possible while holding technique, and enjoying the company of other athletes. It was also a privilege to compete on the same race course with the best Open division paddlers in the US, some of whom went on to compete at Worlds in Szeged, Hungary at the end of August.
