A mild day sparked the opening of action packed racing at the 2011 ICF Canoe Sprint World Cup in Duisburg, Germany. With a light wind cooling the spectators and athletes alike, the scene was set for a great day of racing. The first major final of the day was set aside for the WK1 1000m, which also kicked off the live television broadcast for the event, with Krisztina Zur from the USA taking home the gold. A very close race saw Natalya Sergeyeva (KAZ) only 0:00.883 seconds behind and in second place. Poland’s Edyta Dzieniszewska came in with a strong time of 4:00.924 seconds and in third place.

The WK2 1000m supplied some exciting results with the silver medal going to Lamei Yu and Wenjun Ren of China, who managed to hold an impressive lead throughout most of the race before as the Austria team, Viktoria Schwarz, Yvonne Schuring slipped ahead of them at the last minute and took the lead and the Gold. Anne Knorr and Birka Zimmermann earned the Bronze on their home course in Germany.

Following up on his impressive win in Racice, Rene Holten Poulsen (DEN) took the gold once again in the MK1 1000m, managing to pull ahead and take the lead which had been held from the beginning by Adam van Koeverden from Canada. A very impressive performance was seen from Norway’s Eirik Verass Larsen, who after a slow start managed to explode in the final third distance take third place, pulling just ahead of Germany’s Max Hoff.

Thrilling the local crowds, Germany’s very own Sebastian Brendel took the MC1 1000m gold. Closely followed by the up and coming legend from Canada, Mark Oldershaw whose performance this season has shown his ever increasing skills. Mathieu Goubel from France continued to show off his quality moves after taking third place just microseconds behind Oldershaw.

Once again, Krisztina Zur from USA took gold, this time in the WK1 500m. Germany’s own Nicole Reinhardt showed her well established skills after claiming the silver, just before the Henriette Engel Hansen (DEN) took the bronze just a second behind Reinhardt resulting in a tremendously close race.

Germany once again had further reason to celebrate as Andreas Ihle and Martin Hollstein took the gold in the MK2 500m. Russia double Vasily Pogreban and Vitaly Yurchenko powered through to take the silver, only half a second behind the leaders. Jan Sterba and Ondrej Horsky pulled in even closer to steal in at third.

Russian team Nikolay Lipkin and Victor Melantyev went into first place swiftly after a strong race in the MC2 1000m, closely followed by Maksim Prokopenko, Sergiy Bezugliy from Azerbaijan who raced a superb race, slipping only to second place towards the end. Another win for China as Qiang Li and Maoxing Huang took a solid third place, just over 1 second behind the leaders.

The WK4 500m gold medal went to Louisa Sawers, Hayleigh Mason, Jessica Walker and Abigail Edmonds of Great Britain, finishing with an impressive 1:34.086. Germany showed their strength again as Tina Dietze, Franziska Weber, Silke Hormann and Carolin Leonhardt took second place, losing their poll position at the last moment to the British. Poland fielded a strong team, coming in third with Magdalena Krukowska, Edyta Dzieniszewska, Ewelina Wojnarowska and Karolina Naja.

With a strong level of performance from both local and international athletes, the first set of finals proved to be immensely exciting and provided some very interesting results. As the day winds to a close, the stage is set for intense racing tomorrow, the third and final day of racing for this World Cup. New opportunities await the athletes as they prepare for their final push to the finish and tomorrow promises some exciting performances.