Nicolaas Harding | @nickhdg | London - Sportscene Director Rob interviewed Jess Fox, London 2012 K1 slalom silver-medallist, in La Seu d'Urgell at the third World Cup Canoe Slalom about her thoughts on the gender equality issue surrounding Olympic women's canoe disciplines.

While interviewing several people last season concerning this theme, we obviously came across different opinions. We appreciate that some people think that Women's C1 is not ready yet to become an Olympic discipline and decided to turn their thoughts into questions. Questions we then asked in our interview with Jess Fox. Below some of the questions and for the full five minutes interview you can watch the video in the above.

Rob: “Should C1 Women become an Olympic discipline?”

Jess: “I don't think there's any question about it. C1 Women needs to become Olympic. And gender equity; that's something that needs to happen. There's a few steps that have to happen before [we become Olympic], that comes with the individual federations so hopefully more girls get involved. C1 Women should be in the Olympics.”

Rob:  “We only had 8 [female] participants in Cardiff, we are still seeing missed gates and a  lot of touches. Do you think that the girls' field is already ready to participate in an  Olympic discipline?”

Jess: “That's a tough question. Some of the best girls aren't here, they haven't been racing  these World Cups as they haven't been funded by their federations where it is an  Olympic year. C1 Women has been in the shadow this year. There are a few girls who weren't able to come to these events because they didn't have the means while other  teams did. The courses might have been a bit hard [this weekend]; maybe it was a bit messy and some might say we aren't ready but I think we've come so far in just a few years.”

Rob: “There are people who think that the discipline should be established first, as in number of participants and performance, before becoming Olympic. There are also people who say 'let's make it an Olympic discipline and we'll support its development.' What do you think?”

Jess: “I definitely think that by making it an Olympic sport a lot more women will take it up  as a sport because they know they could possibly go to the Games. They could have  more recognition and would be like the K1 women in other events.”

For the full five minutes interview you can watch the video in the above.

Overview media women's canoe: www.sportscene.tv/news/gender-equality-in-womens-canoeing-links-to-media