Spanish Marathon Championships (II): Iván Alonso claims a great K1 victory

The day before, Saturday, it was time for the K1s, where the local Iván Alonso was the main favorite, as he already won in spring the Spanish Cup and the World Cup at Copenhaguen. At the start line, fighting for their chance, were some other great paddlers like Jorge Alonso, José Julián Becerro, Rafael Carril, Xabier Ruíz de Aretxabaleta, David Rodríguez Dorado and even Julio Martínez, paddling again on a K1 since a long time ago.

From the first lap, all of this favorites were in the leading group, except surprisingly Julio Martínez and José Julián Becerro, suffering just a few metres behind, and José María Pariente, Spanish Champion just two years ago, who didn’t look like having his best day. The positive surprise was the appearance among the best ones of Julio Moreno, one of the outsiders of the race.

The very steep bank for the portage. Photo: Fotoyos

At half of the competition, more or less, it was pretty clear who would be the candidates for the two quota places for Rome, es there were four solid leaders (Xabier Ruiz de Aretxabaleta, Iván Alonso, Jorge Alonso y David Rodríguez Dorado) and three paddlers who went forth and back on each lap, suffering to much to be considered in good position for the medals (Rafael Carril, Julio Moreno y José Julián Becerro). This last one, Becerro, finally retired and only Carril managed to stay forward until the end.

Marathon and Surfski start their season in Spain

After two months with everybody focused on the 5.000 metres races, Spanish canoeing season spreads now towards spring in a variety of disciplines and two out of them have already seen their first competitions this last weekend.

This is the case of the Spanish Surfski Cup, which consists on five races mostly along the Mediterranean coast. The first one was held last Saturday at Denia (quite closed location to Villajoyosa, where the International Euro Challenge will be held on May 4th). Borja Estomba (Feve - Oviedo Kayak) in K1 and the U23 Iñaki Bisellach and Biel Palmer (R.C.N. Palma - O.S. La Caixa) in K2 claimed victory to start leading the Spanish Cup under a sunny weather and rather calmed water.

You can read at this link the full results.

Further North, at the Basque Country, it was also held the Regional Marathon Championship, where 2011 Spanish bronze medalist Xabier Ruiz de Aretxabaleta (Donostia Kayak) went for gold beating in a closed sprint the former world champion Jorge Alonso, who was participating as a guest.

Xabier Ruiz is the new Basque Marathon Champion

In a rainy afternoon at Orio's bay, the K2 category was closely competed for the first half of the race, with four boats fighting in a leading bunch through the first kilometres, but it was broken up at the first portage at the beach and the final victory went to Iosu Ansola and Haize Galarraga (Itxas-Gain K.E.).

The full results can be checked at this link.