European Championships
Hiller/Grossmann get EM gold in the canoe
Martin Hiller (l) and Tamas Grossmann are happy about the EM gold in the kayak twos. photo
© Ulrich Gamel/Kolbert-Press/dpa
Exceptional canoeist Sebastian Brendel finished the home European Championships in Munich with three medals.
Exceptional canoeist Sebastian Brendel finished the home European Championships in Munich with three medals.
The three-time Olympic champion and eleven-time world champion secured bronze with his partner Tim Hecker over 500 meters in the canoe doubles. In an exciting and close race, the German duo were only eleven hundredths of a second behind the second-placed Poles. Gold went to world champions Spain.
“On the one hand we are happy, but it was also close to second place,” said Brendel on ZDF. The 35-year-old had previously won gold twice: on Saturday in the Canadian one over 5000 meters and previously with Hecker in the two Canadian over the 1000 meter distance.
On the final day on the Olympic Canal in Oberschleißheim, Martin Hiller and Tamas Grossmann provided the sixth German gold medal. Only two weeks after their victory at the World Championships in Canada, the duo also secured the European title in the kayak double over 1000 meters. Potsdam won with a lead of 0.693 seconds over Spain, bronze went to the duo from Italy.
In the kayak twos over 500 meters, Felix Frank and Moritz Florstedt were happy about silver behind the Hungarians, who overtook the Germans after a lead of a good boat length in the final sprint and ended up having a lead of 0.293 seconds.
Lisa Jahn and Sophie Koch also took bronze in the Canadian doubles over 200 meters, the title went to Hungary ahead of Spain. Jule Hake and Paulina Paszek also secured the bronze medal in the 200-meter sprint in kayak pairs. The favorites from Hungary were unbeatable, silver went to Poland.
In the last race of the title fights, Annika Loske won the silver medal in the Canadian single over 5000 meters. The 24-year-old from Potsdam was only beaten by the Spaniard Maria Corbera.
Two-time Paralympic champion Edina Müller secured the second gold medal for the German para-canoe team on Sunday with her victory in the class KL1 race over 200 meters.