Thanks for all the messages through my Olympic campaign. It has been an unbelievable ride for the slalom team. 2 medals from 4 classes, awesome. The Australian slalom team is ranked 3rd in these games, behind Slovakia (3 Gold) and Germany (1 Gold). Well above France the coaches keep smiling about.
The venue was brilliant. It had a 12 thousand person capacity grandstand which was right on the white water. Most people could see 90% of the course. The actual whitewater is the toughest in the world. They have written China in foot high concrete on the bottom which sends the water in random directions creating a massive challenge. The international canoeing body ICF had appealed to the Chinese officials to change it, there was no love. The ICF set the course so we new it was going to be a relative easy gate setup on the hard variable water, they had no option. With only 1 wave surf in the final coach Ben and I was hoping for a little more use of the features. The water proved to be so hard and variable, mixed in some Olympic pressure the big mistakes started flowing. 3 medal potential athletes missed the semi final in both the mens and ladies kayak.
The first big fatality in C1 was Tony Estanguet, the 2000 & 2004 Olympic Gold medalist knocked out after the semifinals. I was positioned 5th after a 2 second penalty knocked me from 2nd going into the finals. It was always going to be hard to push for gold from 5th. I knew the minor medals were achievable with a good performance. I had a good run, I was hit by the 'stir-fry' wave and dropped a bit of speed, other than that I was really happy. Dave Florence from GB followed me down and went into the lead by just under 2 seconds. He was killing me both runs from gates 6 to 9, I tried to pull some back but struggled all week through this section. I had him on all the other splits. Sitting at the finish was similar to Athens for me, my fate was in other racers hands, somewhere I don't like to be. I was in 2nd with 3 boats to go. Polish, Czech and Slovakia. I thought I would take the Polish, but was unsure of the Czech and knew the Slovakian was good. I watched the Polish guy loop around for gate 15, and Jezek the Czech a good mate of mine came unstuck on the cross from 3 to 4. Michal Martikan from Slovakia was awesome. He put down 2 fast runs that won him his 2nd Olympic Gold to go with his 2 Olympic Silvers, dating back to Atlanta, impressive.
It has been 9 days since my race, and I am struggling. There has been some sickness floating around the Australian team. I had a few nights with 17 mates who watched the event. They were awesome dressed in fluro green and gold, I could see them while warming up 600m away.
I will be back in Sydney on the 26th, and I am touring the country for the welcome home parades, Sydney, Melbourne, Hobart, Adelaide and Perth. All this happens in the 3rd week of september. I should also be in Perth for the first week of October.
Cheers
Rob