Butterly wins Gold at Marathon Worlds

Last week saw the Canoe Marathon World Championships take place in Gyor, Hungary. Over the 4 days of competition athletes competed on both Long & Short course.

The highlight of the week was Sean Butterly of Salmon Leap Canoe Club taking the Gold medal in the U18 Men Long course. With a large field of 38 paddlers, Sean broke away early in a lead group of 4 before breaking away from this with a South African paddler at the 2nd to last portage. The 2 stayed together for the last lap & in the short 500M lap after the last portage, Sean sprinted away from his rival to take the Gold Medal.

The 4 days of competition saw some excellent, entertaining racing & very good performances by the young Irish squad with some excellent results.

U18 Women Short Course: Lucy Cullen13th

U18 Men Short Course: Sean Smyth 10th, Sean Butterly 12th

U18 Women Long Course: Lucy Cullen 5th, Emily Roche 22nd

U18 men Long Course: Sean Butterly 1st, Sean Smyth 12th

U23 Men Long Course: Paul Donnellan 19th

Full results can be found here

All races were streamed & can be found on the ICF YouTube channel

In the days leading up to the World Championships, the Master World Championships took place. Ireland was once again well represented with Mick & Breda Keating, Peter Egan, Declan Halton & David Horkan all competing. Congratulations to Breda Keating on her Gold medal in the K2 race