National Selection for Robin Jeffery
The fast, powerful and unforgiving rapids of Bradys Lake in the heart of Tasmania hosted the third senior canoe slalom selection event on the weekend with WAIS athlete Robin Jeffery securing his selection onto the 2013 Australian team.
Jeffery was joined by Lucien Delfour, Jessica Fox and Rosalyn Lawrence in securing senior selection after each recorded victories in their respective events.
The setting at Bradys is a special one with its giant drop at the start of the course, followed by shallow and fast moving water in the middle and lower sections providing plenty of thrills and spills, with two athletes snapping their paddles during their runs.
One paddler who didn’t seem to have much difficulty was London Olympian Robin Jeffery who continued his excellent start to 2013, following up his silver from the Australian Open a fortnight ago with a win in the C1 competition at Brayds.
“It is awesome here, I love coming down, it is fast and exciting and you can feel your heart beating through your chest, it is great down here,” Jeffery said.
“It was a lot of fun, really challenging course, I think we saw some really good racing today.”
Jeffery executed his run to perfection producing a clean and fast run of 104.26 to claim the victory, 0.61 seconds ahead of Melbourne’s Christian Fabris with Ian Borrows in third.
Jeffery also combined with Ethan Hodson in the men’s C2, moving a step closer to senior selection in the discipline he represented Australia in at last year’s Olympic Games.
“It has been so fun paddling with Ethan (Hodson) at the front, we get along really well and I think hopefully we have just made percentage so I am pretty happy with that,” said Jeffery.
NSWIS star Rosalyn Lawrence was too good in the women’s K1 winning her second event this year after she kick started 2013 with victory at Nationals.
The younger sister of 2008 Beijing silver medallist Jacqui was simply too good executing a clean run to win in 110.28, 5.83 seconds ahead of London Olympic silver medallist Jessica, with Alison Borrows two second further adrift.
“I was pretty happy with my run and it is always nice to come out on top so it was a good result for me,” said Lawrence.
Fox bounced back in the women’s C1 final with a simply dominant performance from the 19 year old. Fox won in 119.71, 10.74 seconds ahead of Borrows with Melbourne canoe club paddler Maggie Webster rounding off the podium.
“In C1 I am happy with my second run, I managed to do things better than in K1 so that is always good,” said Fox.
All disciplines will be contested once again tomorrow for the final selection event for the senior team this year.
Asked how she will approach tomorrow Fox responded, “The same as today, the first run is like a semi final and the second run is a final so you have to be on it for the second run.”
Finally, 24 year old Lucien Delfour has stitched up his place on the senior team another yet another victory in the men’s K1 open event, just a fortnight after he won bronze at the Australian Open behind Czech Jiri Prskavec.
Delfour posted the only sub 100 time of the day in the final, crossing the finish in 99.55 to finish 0.92 seconds ahead of Joey Croft, with Victorian Jaxon Merritt third 1.26 seconds behind Delfour’s winning time.
Asked if he is happy with his performance today Delfour responded, “Sort of, I thought it was alright, I thought it was safe and not too slow but it turns out that I could be much faster.”
– Australian Canoeing