It's time to start awarding some medals at Eton Dorney, Buckinghamshire, site of the canoe sprint regatta for the London Olympics.
First up today was the 1000-meter men's single kayak. The two favorites coming in were Canada's Adam van Koeverden, who likes to go out strong but smooth and gradually lengthen his margin over the rest of the field, and Germany's Max Hoff, who typically relies upon a strong second-half surge after sitting in the pack early on. Hoff had reigned as 1000-meter world champion for two years before van Koeverden took over the title last year.
Today's final shaped up just as expected: van Koeverden had nearly a boatlength lead at 250 meters and crossed the 500-meter mark approximately on pace for a world-best time. Hoff, meanwhile, was back in the pack but working his way up.
In the end, neither of them took the gold. Eirik Veras Larsen of Norway, who had retired from the sport but decided to come back out when his wife made the Norwegian Olympic team, paddled a very strong second half and surged into the lead with about 50 meters to go. It was a second Olympic gold for Larsen, who won this event in 2004 and took silver in 2008. Van Koeverden held on for silver and Hoff emerged from the pack to win the bronze.
In the 1000-meter C1 final, rising star Sebastien Brendel of Germany won the gold medal in dominating fashion. The 24-year-old Brendel won bronze medals at the world championships in 2009 and 2010 before failing to finish this event because of a broken paddle last year. Spain's David Cal came from nowhere to claim the silver, and is now Spain's most successful Olympian in any sport. Cal has quite a collection of silver medals, having now won two at the Olympics to go with three in world championships competition.
Canadian Mark Oldershaw, whose father and grandfather both were Olympians in flatwater sprint, won bronze.
The nation of Hungary is, by far, the all-time medal leader in canoe sprint, and it added another gold today as Rudolf Dombi and Roland Kokeni won the 1000-meter K2 event. By contrast, Portugal had never won a canoe sprint medal until today's second-place finish by Fernando Pimenta and Emanuel Silva. Andreas Ihle and Martin Hollstein took the bronze. Ihle, 33, is a three time world championships medalist in this event with three different partners; he won the worlds with Hollstein in 2010.
Hungary wasn't finished. In 500-meter K4W, the Hungarians sprinted out to a lead and survived several challenges before pulling away to win. Germany won the silver, Belarus the bronze. The Polish women finished about two tenths of a second out of the medals after setting a world best in the semifinal round on Monday.
NBC has posted a set of videos of today's racing that everybody is allowed to watch. Watch them here.
More medals will be won tomorrow, as the 1000-meter C2, 1000-meter K4, 500-meter K1W, and 500-meter K2W will race their finals.
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