The New Zealand National Championships are coming up next weekend and I am not feeling fully prepared! My training was going real good, until I got a cold this week meaning I'm unable to train, trying to get rid of it before the race.
Anyway, the race should be awesome with 100's of competitors from all over New Zealand. Secondary Schools Championships start this week on tuesday, where me and Ben will make the course for the race and do demonstration runs, should be interesting! At nats, i'm doing teams runs with Aaron and Andy, so hopefully we can take out the Open Mens category! Would be pretty cool to do so! For results of the race and information visit www.slalomnz.org.nz
I tried out my new GOPRO today and took some pretty cool shots (Images and video) will upload the video asap! Check out the pics.
I just got a GOPRO camera the other day, one of the most amazing and fun tools for photos and video. I'm planning on making some videos etc in NZ and with my trips to Europe this year. There waterproof ability allows you to use them on your boat helmet, anywhere. Here's a video from 12 Productions, which in some shots uses a camera similar. Check it out.
I'm now the distributor for RAAB paddles in New Zealand. RAAB is a Czech brand and is used by many international stars, Peter Kauzer, Jana Dukatova, Elena Kaliska and many more. There paddles come in all shapes and sizes to suit your paddling style.
The paddles are feather light, but remain strong due to there new technology and high flexibility. If your interested in seeing the paddles specifications you can find them on www.raab-paddles.com. If you have any questions or queries feel free to email me and ask callumgibb@hotmail.com.
Mangahou put on some pretty decent weather for the last selection races, with no rain which is unusual for the gorge. The race was really well organized and was a Oceania Championships, ICF ranking race and NZ selection race.The 3rd and 4th selection races for me had some ups and downs! In order to make the senior team I had to step my racing up a notch. The first day I went down the course with a really good plan for my run. Instead I was thinking about my pace instead of my lines I ended up going straight past the 2nd gate.. Not really what I had planned..
2nd runs I decided to throw it down. The top of my run 1-13 went really well preparing for all the staggers and doing some pretty decent upstreams. Towards the bottom things started to get average finishing in 11th place overall against the international field with paddlers from Canada all over Europe and Australia, I was pretty pleased. I ended up 3rd in the NZ seniors. That night I went home pretty pleased with my placing. Then I calculated the points and realized I had to win the seniors to make the team... I kind of wish I didn't realize this since it was all that was on my mind. I turned up to the race feeling the pressure, it showed in my first run. I went down the course off line in most of the moves, muscling my way back on line, crabbing down the course. I finished in 12th position which is a pretty good placing, but with the run I just had I knew I could of done a lot better. Second runs was the last run and chance to make the senior team. I wasn't feeling the pressure which isn't what I like, I wasn't focused on the race my mind was all over the place.. I touched the first up made errors but finished it off coming 3rd again as the other senior blew out as well but worse.
I was still 1st Junior team member for the 3rd year in a row, 4th year in the team. I finished 2nd in the junior category behind Czech star Jiri Prskavec. I also took out the Junior Oceania Champion for the second year in a row so showing a solid start to year! Bring on Australia..
The best three in each category are in the Senior Team and the top six for Juniors as it is only a Pre-World Championships for 2011 held in Wassau, America.
This weekend the first two selection races took place on the Tarawera River, Kawerau. Course was designed by Bryden Nicholas and Vavrenic Hradileck from the Czech Republic, was a pretty tricky course with some tight staggers. Day 1 went pretty good for me, I went into the race with a clear head knowing exactly what I was going to do. I went down the course, paddling everything smoothly not cutting my lines and playing it safe in the difficult moves. I got off the river feeling it was a pretty solid run, then saw the results saying I was winning not only junior men but open men! Was a great surprise. Second runs I wasn't as focused only finding out my run time not so long before hopping on. I hit a rock whilst doing a tight stagger arriving late on the last gate in the sequence, then came in tight into the upstream, hitting it, then went a low into upstream 13, and making a mess of the bottom stagger. I was pretty disapointed with this run because of the number of small mistakes. Johann, Mike and Aaron the senior K1 Men had better second runs to push me down to fourth place, with Aaron Osborne taking out a win in the first selection race for K1 men.
157 K1W Ella Nicholas U23 R1 119.01 4 123.01 R2 129.01 0 129.01 Best 123.01
154 K1W Katrina Van Wijk (CANADA) R1 118.28 4 122.28 R2 121.92 2 123.92 Best 122.28155 K1W Nikki Whitehead U23 R1 117.73 0 117.73 R2 115.84 2 117.84 Best 117.73158 K1W Louise Jull U23 R1 111.51 0 111.51 R2 112.25 2 114.25 Best 111.51159 K1W Luuka Jones U23 R1 102.24 6 108.24 R2 105.36 0 105.36 Best 105.36
Today, Sunday the 23rd racing was cancelled due to rain all last night and all today flooding the river, which was still rising from it's inital flow of 20 Cumecs, to 40 Cumecs, meaning the flow will be changing all day, and judging would be very difficult in these conditions. With only two races left I'll have to pull something out of the bag!
The New Zealand National Championships are coming up next weekend and I am not feeling fully prepared! My training was going real good, until I got a cold this week meaning I'm unable to train, trying to get rid of it before the race.
At nats, i'm doing teams runs with Aaron and Andy, so hopefully we can take out the Open Mens category! Would be pretty cool to do so! For results of the race and information visit www.slalomnz.org.nz
