Story by Guy Dresser
Photos: Jens Thybo

The World Paddle Awards took place late last month [24th February] in Silkeborg, Denmark at a highly successful gala dinner attended by some of the biggest names in paddlesport.

WORLD PADDLE AWARDS

Now in their fourth edition, the WPA gains in stature every year, attracting global interest in its celebration of the most remarkable individuals in the world of paddlesports. The Awards recognize not just the leading athletes across all disciplines, but all the others who put their time and effort into the sport – from coaches and officials, to club managers, event organizers and media outfits.

Stars of the show in Silkeborg included South Africa’s 10-time World Champion Hank McGregor, who won the WPA Academy award in recognition of his dominance of marathon canoeing and ocean racing. Fresh from victory in the 2018 Dusi Canoe Marathon the previous weekend, McGregor said he was, “Delighted” with the WPA recognition and indicated he was not done yet, promising more great results later this season.

“I’m as hungry for success now as I ever have been and am looking forward to continue competing around the world this year,” he said.

Australia’s 19-time World Champion Jess Fox, was voted Sportswoman of the Year after becoming the first woman to win five [senior] world championship slalom titles. She told Master of Ceremonies Ivan Lawler, the British Canoeing President and five-time World Champion, that 2017 had not been her best-ever season.

Fox ended her consecutive run of C1 world championship titles, a loss she described as a, “Massive disappointment”, but like all setbacks it had been an opportunity to learn something about herself, she said.

“The trajectory to success is not a straight line,” she told Lawler after accepting her Golden Paddle. “It’s about bouncing back and I’ve learned to do that. My aim is still on the 2020 Olympic Games. I have a bronze and a silver medal, so there’s definitely one left to get. It’s unfinished business.”

Slovenian Olympic Silver medalist Peter Kauzer, who has claimed a medal at every major event in the sport, won the Sportsman of the Year award. He joined the Awards via video from Australia where he’s on a three-month training camp and said he remained focused on a better-than-ever season in 2018.

The winners of the awards each receive the Golden Paddle, a symbol of how each discipline, however different in sensation it may be, requires a paddle used from a boat on the water.

Other winners included Barbara Dimovova from the Czech Republic, who picked up the Junior of the Year award. She has dominated the junior women’s single class in Wildwater racing, her results including four medals at the Junior World Championships in Murau, Austria.

There was also recognition for those working behind the scenes.
Slovenian photographer and journalist Nina Jelenc won the Media Professional of the Year for her work at the European Canoe Association and for the International Canoe Federation’s Planet Canoe magazine. The media category was hotly contested with recognition for the Paddler Ezine, published by Peter Tranter and Luis Pedro Abreu, whose kayaksurf.net website has become the world’s most popular platform for surf kayaking and waveski.

Dennis Newton from Great Britain won the WPA’s Foundation Award for his role in coaching and growing the sport of freestyle kayaking. With over 25 World Championship medals and 30 European Championship medals, Dennis is by far one of the most medal abundant coaches in paddlesports.

A popular local winner was Denmark’s Finn Larsen, recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award for having introduced generations of world-class athletes into canoeing and his sterling work promoting his home club Maribo Kajakklub around the world on social media.

The organizing team of the 2017 World Championships in Pau, France picked up Industry Professional of the Year after staging the ‘giant triple’, the World Championships for Canoe Slalom, Wildwater, and Extreme Slalom simultaneously – the first time this has ever been achieved.

There was a special award for Andre Santos, Chief Executive Officer of NELO Kayaks, now the world’s largest maker of competitive canoes. The company is an Official Partner of the WPA and a longstanding supporter of numerous top athletes worldwide. Santos received an inscribed luxury timepiece in recognition of NELO’s contribution to the sport from Canadian Olympic kayak medalist Mark de Jonge, who runs de Jonge Watch.

Rob van Bommel, the World Paddle Awards founder and head of independent media company Sportscene, said another successful edition of the Awards confirmed the worldwide support for initiatives that unite all paddlesports.

“It’s at times like these that you realize there is so much that we all have in common,” he said. “We have a fantastically diverse sport and seeing all these top people, whether they’re competitors or doing their thing on the bank, come together is very rewarding. We’re looking forward to many more years of the World Paddle Awards.”