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Fifteen nations have a right to participate in the men’s kayak four 500 metres event (MK4 500m), which will see the new champions on the third competition day of the European Games Krakow-Malopolska 2023. The heats and semi-finals of the event are scheduled for 21^st June and final will be on 23^rd June at 14:20.

 

There will be 15 crews on the start line, representing Czech Republic, Denmark, Spain, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal, Serbia, Slovakia, Sweden and Ukraine, which promises exciting and tough races.

 

Crews from Germany, Spain and Slovakia were among the best at the biggest international events of the past seasons, but there are also representatives from France, Ukraine, Hungary, Lithuania, Denmark ... waiting for their chance of glory.

 

The defending European Champions from last year’s European Championships in Munich are representatives of Germany, with Max Rendtschmidt, Tom Liebscher, Jacob Schopf and Max Lemke taking a gold medal at their home venue. Samuel Balaz, Denis Mysak, Csaba Zalka and Adam Botek from Slovakia were second and France’s Guillaume Burger, Maxime Beaumont,Quillian Koch and Guillaume Le Floch took the bronze medal.

 

Germans are also the reigning Olympic Champions from Tokyo, where Spanish K4 with Saul Craviotto, Marcus Cooper Walz, Carlos Arevalo and Rodrigo Germade won silver medal and Slovakian kayak four picked up bronze medal.

 

In addition to Spain’s Tokyo Olympic silver, the crew from Iberian Peninsula won the 2022 World Champion title ahead of Germany and Ukraine with Oleh Kukharyk, Dmytro Danylenko, Ihor Trunov and Ivan Semykin.

 

Ukrainians are in good form this season. Kukharyk, Danylenko, Trunov and Semykin  were the winners of the second World Cup race of the season, held this May in Poznan, where Australians finished second and Denmark (Victor Gairy Aasmul, Lasse Bro Madsen, Morteh Graversen, Magnus Sibbersen) took the bronze medal.

 

In addition to Denmark and Ukraine who were medallists of the second World Cup of the season, and Spain taking silver in the first World Cup, two more nations proved they will be also the ones to watch. Simonas Maldonis, Mindaugas Maldonis, Ignas Navakauskas and Arturas Seja from Lithuania were namely the winners of the first World Cup race of the year in Szeged, and Hungarians Istvan Kuli, Kolos Csizmadia, Bence Nadas and Sandor Totka took bronze medal at their home World Cup.

 

This will be the second time men’s kayak four is included in the European Games sports programme. In 2019 European Games the gold medal went to Russia, silver to Germany and bronze to Slovakia.