Canoeing
Woods shines at Olympic venue

RUGBY Canoe Club's Kimberley Woods picked up an excellent result when competing in the British Open and Double Premier Race which took place at the Lea Valley Olympic Slalom Course.

Playing host to the final two National Premier Division races of the 2012 season, combined with the British Open, the event saw the Premier races run to a standard format with the best run from the two deciding the winner, whilst the British Open used the first day as qualification before the first run of the second race was used as the semi-final and the last run as a final - with competitors dropping out along the way.

The course designers presented athletes with two challenging courses over the weekend, with fast racing in mind.

Woods took part in the events that included all GB Senior, u23 and junior team members as part of the Premier Division entry and best of the Division One paddlers of the year. The British Open had guests from Germany and the Czech Republic, including Karolina Galaskova, the 2012 Junior European K1W Champion.

Woods came second in the C1W class on Saturday after losing several seconds in an upstream move.

She followed that with a fourth place on Sunday which, although though she was disappointed by the result, it was in part due to changing her paddling style in a bid to progress next year.

However, with her consistency, she came second in the British Open and third in the National Senior rankings.

Racing in her K1, Woods came an excellent fifth in the first race and improved that to fourth on Sunday with only the Senior team in front of her in the Premier race.

Impressively, Woods beat Galaskova in both races and the British Open which will give her more confidence at next year’s World and European Championships.

Following a very competitive year, Woods is third in the National Senior rankings in K1W, just ahead of GB Olympian Lizzie Neave.

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