Veterans Make Way for Newcomers on Sprint World Championship Stage

Szeged, Hungary – A flurry of fresh faces was sprinkled in among the many decorated veterans that took to the podium today at the 2011 ICF World Sprint Championships.

Among Olympic events, the Austrian Women’s K-2 500m team may have pulled off the biggest upset of the day, defeating a field dominated by a veritable Who’s Who of sprint powerhouses such as Germany, Hungary, Russia and Romania. Yvonne Schuring and Viktoria Schwarz screamed, cried and couldn’t stop smiling as they absorbed the enormity of their first World Championship win.

“All we wanted was a Top Six finish to qualify for the Olympics. We never thought about Gold; all we did was give it all with no looking left or right,” said Schuring.

“I still can’t believe it,” Schwarz said nearly speechless.

In a country best known on the international sports stage for its skiing prowess, Schuring and Schwarz hope their victory here today helps spur interest in their sport and get more people involved in kayaking.

Also shocked to find themselves atop the podium was the relatively young Hungarian K-2 Men’s 500m team. Tamas Kulifai and David Toth were quick to credit a change of coaches with their success. Paddling together just since the start of this season, the duo has been working with Hungarian coaching legend Katalin Rozsnyoi. The six-time Coach of the Year (2001 – 2006) is strict, they said, noting today’s result makes all that hard work and discipline worthwhile.

Like other Hungarian medalists during these Championships, Kulifai and Toth acknowledged the palpable power of the fans as a big help in their race where the margin of victory was so thin, first to third place were separated by little more than half a second.

Indeed, crowd noise was a factor even if you weren’t a Hungarian athlete. Canadian Gold medalists Laurence Vincent-LaPointe and Mallorie Nicholson still seemed nearly as awed by the atmosphere of the race as they were by their underdog victory in the C-2 500m division.

“I was pretty overwhelmed the last 200 meters, with the crowd cheering, I’ve never experienced anything like that in my life,” Nicholson said. Vincent-LaPointe added, “The crowd was so loud I couldn’t hear myself think.”

Crowd noise wasn’t able to help Hungary’s K-4 1000m men’s team in the final Olympic event of the day. In this grueling distance race, Australia led until the last 250 meters when Germany turbocharged its pace and edged ahead for the Gold. The Australian team, happy enough to improve from fifth place at last year’s Worlds, vowed they would have to just “go one better next year,” meaning at the London 2012 Olympic Games. Russia eked out 0.744 seconds ahead of Slovakia.

Other German‘s topping the podium today included Nicole Reinhart in K-1 500m and Tom Wylenzek and Stefan Holtz I C-2 1000m. Reinhart’s World Championship medal count now stands at an even dozen; seven Gold, five Silver. As for the men, Holtz’s now holds eight World medals and a chance to earn his first Olympic medal next year in London. Wylenzek’s newest Gold medal garnishes an impressive array of international medals including a trio of Olympic medals from Athens and Beijing. In all, by the end of the day, Germany had notched two more Golds and seven more Olympic qualifications for a total of eight medals to date, giving them a scant one medal over Hungary with one day left of competition. In third place for overall medals is Belarus with five.

For complete results, daily programs and more, visit the official website for Szeged2011.com or link straight to the results.

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