PARIS (Reuters) – A Monday that started with nerves and excitement so great that they could barely eat ended with Olympic medals for Britain’s Joe Clarke and Kimberley Woods as the first-ever kayak cross competition reached its climax at the Paris Games.
The two world number ones had been hotly tipped to become the first Olympic champions but after three races Clarke had to be content with a silver and Woods a bronze after some phenomenal action at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium.
“It’s been a long, long day — this morning we sat and ate breakfast all together; we had about 20 grams of porridge each because we felt very nervous and excited, in equal amounts,” Clarke told Reuters following his silver-medal run.
“But we managed to get through till half-past three when the racing kicked off, and then Kim went off and absolutely smashed it to start the day, which was good,” he added.
In Monday’s finals, four racers dropped into the water together to attack the 210-metre course, performing an “Eskimo roll” that required them to submerge their heads in the water and passing through 10 gates as they vied to be fastest to the bottom, with the top two progressing.
The 32 racers – 16 women and 16 men – were whittled down to the last four in each final, with Australia’s Noemie Fox winning the women’s race and New Zealand’s Finn Butcher the men’s, and Woods said she had struggled with nerves all day as she awaited the late afternoon start.
“I was doing sudokus, I was doing anything I possibly could to take my mind off it, but the heart-rate was still going. We were sat alone, still trying to get our food down, going ‘we just want to get going!’, we were just waiting for it,” she told Reuters.
As the stakes increased after each quick-fire race, so too did the nerves.
“I just had to keep breathing and just try and be in the moment, and be present… two medals for Team GB in five or 10 minutes is pretty incredible,” Woods said.
Monday’s medals were the second for both Britons, Clarke adding to the gold he won in the kayak slalom event in Rio in 2016 with Woods having picked up a bronze in the kayak earlier in the Paris Games.
Asked if she would have accepted a bronze medal if it had been offered to her as she struggled to eat her breakfast on Monday morning, Woods smiled broadly.
“I definitely would have said ‘no, give me that gold’ – like, I wanted that so bad, and yeah, I tried to go for it but it didn’t pay off,” she said.
“But you know what? Not many people can come away with two Olympic medals – not many people get one Olympic medal, so to come away with two Olympic medals, I’m really proud.”
(Reporting by Philip O’Connor; editing by Clare Fallon)
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