Marathon World Cup medal haul over a June Bank Holiday Weekend

Last weekend saw the Marathon World Cup take place in Sandvika, Norway. In the Marathon World Cup Ireland was represented by Alex O’Brien and Matt McCartney of Celbridge Paddlers Canoe Club racing in the Junior Men’s class. In the now familiar format of the World Cup the racing kicked off with the short course events. These races take place over 3.4km on a lapped course with 2 portages. Initially the 2 lads were to race in short course heats on Friday evening but this was changed to a straight Final on Saturday Morning.

 

 

 

Both raced well with Alex getting his first taste of International racing & finishing a respectable 13th and gaining valuable experience which he could use on the Sundays 23km race. Matt finished  in 3rd position earning his 1st International podium placing.

 

On Sunday the sun shone as the 23km race kicked off at 9am local time. Alex had a very good finishing position of 14th out of 22 starters. After almost 100 min of racing Matt finished with another Bronze medal, beating the Swede and Norwegian who had finished ahead of him on the Saturday. All in all a massively successful weekend of racing for the Celbridge lads which deserves a huge congratulations. We will see racing return to Sandvika next year as it will be the location of the 2020 Marathon World Championships.