This year’s International Canoe Federation (ICF) World Championship was held in Shaoxing, China between 17 October and 20 October. The Hungarian team earned the most successful nation title with 21 medals in total. Canoe legend, Renáta Csay won her 20th gold medal at the championships.
The Hungarian team earned the most successful nation title as they together won 21 medals, which is twice as many as the second team has won.
Renáta won her first ICF world championship gold medal 20 years ago in 1999. The now 42-year-old canoe legend won her 20th world championship gold medal by piloting 24-year-old Zsófia Czellai-Vörös to a successful defence of their K2 title from 2018. It was Csay’s 13th K2 medal, and she is already planning to return next year.
Renáta Csay now has a gold medal for every year she has raced: 13 of them coming in K2, and 7 in individual K1 races. Alongside her 20 gold medals, she also has 11 silver ones. She is definitely the most successful canoe marathon paddler ever.
“I’m so thankful that I can still be here,” Csay said. “I don’t know how I keep doing it, I just like paddling. I will come back next year.”
Canoeicf.com writes that Csay and Czelia-Vörös did not have an easy time defending the gold medal they won last year. Two Spanish boats teamed up to make their race more complicated, and they were able to break free at the last minute. Czelia-Vörös said about the race:
“It was a bit tough; I think we had a big mistake at the first portage, but I think we managed because we knew that we could catch them.”
In the men’s C2, Dániel Laczó and Gergely Nagy won the bronze medal, and in the men’s K2, Adrián Boros and Krisztián Máthé won silver.
Source: www.canoeicf.com
