Canadian Update From the 2010 European Championships

Hello Lugenews readers! The European Championships was an awesome race. The track in St. Sebastian is super technical and fast. Congratulations, of course, to Patrick for claiming the only gold medal to elude him in his reign.

My race was pretty good. Unfortunately, I didn't really turn on the heat until the last run which was a fast one. Before the run I was sitting in 17th place and moved into 14th afterwards! Thank goodness, I still have yet to place outside of the Top 15 this season so happy days!

I've attached two full run videos with the update. They are from my second and third runs. Apologies for the poor quality of the third run but it was recorded on a cell phone.

All the best and stay fast,

Kaj

2nd Run


3rd Run

2009 Natural Track World Cup #1 St. Sebastian, Austria

Prior to heading over to Europe for the start of the 2009 World Cup season, the Canadian team found themselves in the enviable situation of training domestically. It had been a few years since the team last had the privilege of having a track in Canada to train on before the beginning of the season. Normally the Canadian athletes have to travel to Europe early to work in just a few days of practice before starting the competition season. This year however the track in Grande Prairie was up and iced in mid December which provided the team with two weeks of solid training.

The competitive season began with a World Cup race in St. Sebastian, Austria. Only one Canadian athlete, Kaj Johnson, was able to be in Europe in time to compete in this race. This was Kaj's first time seeing this particular track and he was impressed with it's technical design. Luckily, he was able to land a couple training runs to get accustomed to the new track before the weekend of the race.

After sliding the track a few time through training, Kaj had a few concerns regarding the last chicane before the finish. It was a very fast section and he figured it would be a location of focus for many athletes during the race.

The race began well for Kaj and he posted a time fast enough to leave him sitting in 15th position after the first run. However, as he had suspected the final chicane presented some minor problems for him and many other athletes on the second run and he unfortunately fell behind one place to finish the race at 16th in the final standings. Regardless, this was Kaj’s best World Cup finish to date.