Homestake Creek race attracts people from all over the world. It’s the opportunity to gauge yourself with the best paddlers in the sport. Olympians, future Olympians, World Champs, world cup slalom kayakers, and even the locals all show up to put down their best two runs. Racers come for the $2,000 cash prize, the fame, the american women, or just for the love of competition. This year was some of the tightest competition I’ve ever seen in kayak racing. No one person stood out as the obvious choice for the leader. The flow was around 100 cfs making it just pushy enough to bounce off some rocks and not enough to make it any cleaner. Keeping your kayak up to speed was key with so many direction changes and places to accelerate all over the course.

Teva and the Vail Valley Foundation really know what’s going on when it comes to timing as well. They had on location the exact same timing system used for the Birds of Prey World Cup Ski races in November. So, when Honza Lasko and Mike Dawson tied for first place down to the hundredth of a second there was no questioning it and they fairly split the winnings between themselves, each taking home $1,500. Local transplant Jakub Nemec also crushed his way down finishing 3rd place for the men. On the ladies side it was Adrienne Levknecht holding the top spot for Team Liquidlogic. She killed it on both her runs with her first run good enough to put her in the top 10 of the men!

Brianne Horton was on the camera again capturing some awesome moments from the event. Check them out below.

Mike Dawson, tied for 1st.

Honza Lasko, tied for 1st.

Jakub Nemec, 3rd.

Adrienne, stomping her way to 1st.

Isaac Levinson, with a strong 6th.

Me, Liquidlogic Black Ops style, 12th place.

Nicole Mansfield, representing for Demshitz women.

Till next year, start training hard ‘cus you know the competition is.

SYOTR

Another beautiful pic from Brianne:

The crew in close comfort:

Of course, enjoying the sun in Colorado is never too good to be true. Monday morning we woke to 40 degree temperatures that quickly dropped as we climbed up the pass for some training runs on Homestake creek. I was pumped to put some scratches on my brand-new Black Ops Jefe Grande and get a feel for my local run again. Here are some scenes from the high water training laps on Monday morning.

Isaac flying down his first training run of the season:

Mike Dawson, another strong contender about to take his Leap of Faith on the bottom drop. Definitely trickier at the higher flows:

Honza Lasko, the Czech representation:

And we finished up just in time for the strong storm to swing in. Snow in the end of May, only in CO:

Here is a quick video clip that Team Liquidlogic Isaac Levinson put together from one of his training laps. Enjoy:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Heuer fand zum dritten Mal die Straight Down Striit statt. Organisiert wird dieser Event von Paddlern für Paddler. Ganz klar im Vordergrund steht der Spaß und nicht der eiserene Siegeswille. Wie auch 2007 und 2008 konnte das Org-Team um Ron Fischer, Lukas Wegmann, Silvan Müller und Lukas Wielatt ein super Event auf die Beine stellen.

Die Striit, ein Abschnitt der Sernft gilt unter Wildwasser-Paddlern als Leckerbissen der Alpen. Umrahmt von den wunderschönen schweizer Bergen des Glanerland stürzt sie z.T. 75‰ gen Tal.
Gestartet wurde in drei Rennen – dem Creek Competition, dem Fun Race und der Chinese Race als Trostrunde.
Der Creek Competition begann mit einem Zeitrennen, nur die 32 besten Fahrer zogen in die Heats des Boater Cross ein. Mit einem 19 Platz zog auch ich in  den Boater Cross ein. Nach einem sehr guten Start saß mein Gegner mir im Nacken, bei der Hälfte der Strecke und einem Fahrfehler von mir konnte er dann knapp vorbeiziehen. Damit war mein Aus bereits in der ersten Runde besiegelt. Auch Alex mußte nach dem ersten Heat seinen Jefe Grande zur Seite legen. Überraschend konnte sich jedoch Florian Fischer in seinem Liquidlogic Jefe gegen den ehemaligen Slalom Welt-, Europa- und Deutschenmeister Fabian Dörfler durchsetzen. Im Finale gewann Jakobus Stenglein gegen Ron Fischer. Ron hatte beim Start Pech und parkte im Kehrwasser ein. Damit ging die Striit Krone dieses Jahr nach Deutschland.
Bei den Frauen konnte sich Anne Hübner souverän gegen den Rest des Feldes durchsetzen.

Ein toller Event und wir freuen uns schon auf 2011!

This year the Straight Down Striit took place for the third time. The event is organized by Ron Fischer, Lukas Wegmann, Silvan Müller and Lukas Wielatt – so you could say it is organized by kayakers for kayakers. Having fun is more important than having success, a thought which accompanies the whole event.
The river section Striit is one of the best places in the Alps. With 75‰ it is very steep for a boater cross and for experts only.

The event was devided in three race categories – the Creek Competition, the Fun Race and the Chinese Race as repechage.
The creek competition started with a qualification time run, only the best 32 kayakers qualified for the boater cross. I made it to position 19 after the time race. My boater cross heat started very good and I gained the lead for the first half of the race. Then I made a small mistake and lost the leadership and was eliminated Alex wasn’t lucky in the first heat too. But Florian Fischer suprised on his Liquidlogic Jefe by kicking the former Kayak Slalom World-, European- and German champion Fabian Dörfler out of the race. In the final heat Jakobus Stenglein raced Ron Fischer. Ron had a bad start and pulled in an eddy directly off the starting ramp, so Jakobus won easily.
In the women creek competition Anne Hübner won superiorly.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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Results Straight Down Striit 2010

Fred charging the sesia in his wave hopper.

They now have a 20 year protection plan for the rivers in the area.

And there was a nice event there so I registered because they were pushing me. There was at least 3 to 4 years that I haven’t done any competition. Saturday was a boarder cross were i took the 3rd place not bad knowing the best italien were there. And sunday I finished 5th at the 6mn downriver race, only 10s from the first one without having ever paddled that section of the sesia

All in all pretty happy of the W.E. especially as I get to know more Fred wich is a very nice and interesting guy.

A quick photo of me taken by fred on the sorba: