VICTORIA LAKE (Gauteng) – Hamish Lovemore and Andy Birkett are on their way to the 2024 Olympics while Esti Olivier and Tiffany Koch have earned half their ticket to Paris on the opening day of the South African Canoe Championships at Germiston’s Victoria Lake on Friday.
The championships also double as the Olympic canoeing team selection event for one men’s 500m K2 crew and one women’s 500m K2 crew.
Lovemore and two-time Marathon World Champion Birkett were comfortable winners of the 500m K2 final on Friday to claim the men’s place, while Olivier and Koch won the corresponding women’s event, but still have a tense shootout before they can finalise their selection.
In the men’s final, Lovemore and Birkett raced over the line in a time of one minute 31,12 seconds, a comfortable 1,6 seconds ahead of Shaun Rubenstein and Mike Arthur to claim the Olympic place. Chrisjan Coetzee and Nicholas Weeks, who won the African Championships late last year to earn South Africa a place at Paris 2024, finished third.
In the women’s 500m K2 final, Olivier and Koch took the first step toward booking their flight to Paris, but will still have to survive a tense shootout – or two – before being confirmed as the crew selected to represent South Africa at the Olympics.
The pair were clear winners of the first trial in a time of 1:48.68 to beat fast-finishing former Olympic silver medalist Bridgitte Hartley and former World Surfski Champion Michelle Burn by 0.67 seconds, but that margin is comfortably less than the 1.5% needed for automatic selection.
The relatively close race means the winning two crews will now have a shootout to determine who is selected. If Olivier and Koch secure a second victory in the two-boat shootout on Saturday morning, regardless of the margin, they will earn the selection. If, however, Hartley and Burn can upset the race favourites, a third winner-takes-all shootout will take place on Sunday.
Current South African K2 river champions, Saskia Hockly and Christie Mackenzie, claimed third on Friday, but their time of 1:52:57 was not enough to make it a three-way shootout and they will have to settle for a bronze medal.
Helen Jansen Van Vuuren, who paddled with Olivier at the African Champs to secure South Africa’s place in the Olympics, finished a distant fourth with Amy Duffett.
The shootout between the winning two boats will take place at 8am on Saturday morning.