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Aug. 4, 2011
Competitors from around the region will compete in the first ever Maryland Canoe and Kayak State Championships at the Adventure Sports Center International (ASCI), home to the world’s only mountaintop whitewater course, on Saturday, Aug. 13, from 4 to 6 p.m.
The championship is part of the 2011 Maryland Canoe and Kayak Series produced by the Bethesda Center of Excellence. BCE is marketed as the nation’s premier slalom canoe/kayak training center and is home to two-time Olympic silver medalist Dana Chladek. Chladek is the BCE head coach and will field a team of “young up and coming athletes” at the event.
The state championships will be a first glimpse of whitewater competition at ASCI since it was awarded the International Canoe Federation’s 2014 Canoe Slalom World Championships. ASCI won out over bids from Austria and Poland at the April meeting of the ICF held in Paris.
“Deep Creek 2014,” the official title of the ICF 2014 Canoe Slalom World Championships, is scheduled for September 17 through 21. The event will also mark the 25th anniversary of the highly successful 1989 Canoe Slalom World Championships held on the Savage River in Garrett County.
Canoe slalom refers to ‘decked’ or ‘covered’ whitewater boats which race a series of gates strategically placed over rapids. The four official Olympic disciplines are: single men and women’s kayak (where athletes sit in the boat and use a double bladed paddle) and single and double canoe (where athletes kneel in the boat and use a single bladed paddle).
Maryland has historically fielded the nation’s most successful slalom athletes, including world champions Jon Lugbill, Davey Hearn, Fritz and Lecky Haller, Cathy Hearn, Dana Chladek and Olympic gold medalist Joe Jacobi. Bill Endicott, who is heralded as the most successful canoe coach in U.S. history, is also based in Maryland. The Maryland State Championships will be the first and only state-level whitewater competition in the country.
The championships will take place on the upper section of the ASCI whitewater course. Each run will last around 100 seconds, and athletes will be required to navigate 20 gates while covering 300 meters of rapids.
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