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Familiar canoe marathon as well as canoe sprint names took part in the opening day of the 2021 ECA Canoe Marathon European Championships in Moscow, on the Olympic regatta course Krylatskoye. The short distance races and three junior events were on the programme.

 

Portuguese kayaker Jose Ramalho, multiple Canoe Marathon European Champion, took the win in men’s kayak short distance race. It took him 13 minutes, 43 seconds and 44 hundredths of a second to complete the 3400 metres long course. At the end he was 1.35 seconds faster than French Quentin Urban in second place and 7.27 seconds faster than Hungarian Adrian Boros.

 

In women’s kayak short race Serbia’s Kristina Bedec won the European Champion title after a tight race. At the end she was only 0.64 seconds faster than Hungarian kayaker Vanda Kiszli, the 2019 World Champion in this event. The bronze medal went to the hands of another Hungarian paddler Zsofia Czellai Voros, the 2019 European Champion in short distance marathon.

 

Men’s canoe race was again dominated by Polish paddler. At the last European Championships which was held in 2019 in Decize, France, it was Wiktor Glazunov who took the title and now his successor became his compatriot Mateusz Borgiel. Polish canoeist was almost eleven and a half seconds faster than Hungarian Daniel Laczo, while Russian representative Roman Erlinekov picked up bronze medal.

 

In women’s canoe short race event Hungarian Zsofia Kisban won ahead of Russian Maria Kazakova and Polish paddler Adrianna Antos. The defending European Champion, who is also reigning World Champion Liudmyla Babak from Ukraine did not take part in the competition.

 

Additional three junior events were on the programme today. In women’s junior kayak race Maja Horvath from Hungary won ahead of her compatriot Adel Kalovics and Russian Iuliia Babashinskaia. In men’s junior 19 km long race Bulcsu Ferencz won ahead of Istvan Juhasz (both Hungary), while Portuguese paddler Tomas Sousa won third place. In women’s junior canoe race Alina Kovaleva from Russia won ahead of Hungarian Lili Matkovics.