Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.

Monday, February 28, 2000

World Sprints
qualifying begins

Half of Hawaii's team decided
during races at Keehi
Lagoon yesterday

By Linda Aragon
Special to the Star-Bulletin

Some of the fastest men and women in one-man outrigger canoes overcame tricky winds and tough competition at the World Sprints Hawaii Time Trials at Keehi Lagoon yesterday.

The top two male and female finishers in five divisions earned spots on the Hawaii team which will compete Aug. 12-20 at the World Sprints in Australia.

Each country or area, such as Hawaii, is allowed to send four paddlers to race in each of the age divisions. The remaining two paddlers for each division will be selected at the second round of qualifying time trials April 30.

Yesterday, the largest number of competitors in the quarter-mile races were in the younger age groups. Some were already world sprint veterans, including Karel Tresnak Jr., the winner of last year's Molokai Channel solo canoe race, and OIA OC-1 state champions Mahina Enos (varsity) and Jamie Tsubaki (junior varsity).

All paddlers raced in a Naia-class canoe stripped of its seat padding and rudder. Race director Mary Serrao said having everyone using the same style and weight of canoe kept the competition fair, and gave competitors an opportunity to get used to racing without a rudder, just as they will at the World Sprints.

"There's a lot more concentration on keeping the boat straight," said Tresnak, who normally races the latest OC-1 designs made by his father, Karel Sr. "You have to concentrate on making it into your lane and getting a smooth stroke going."

Enos, a senior at Anuenue School, has trained and raced all season in a rudderless canoe. She said the wind yesterday posed too much of an obstacle.

Enos will return April 30 for the second time trial. She went to the last world sprints held in Fiji in 1998, and "I lost by one second to go into the finals," she said. "It was a big challenge."

The World Sprints also include competition in the six-man (OC-6) and 12-man (OC-12) canoes. There will be no local qualifying trials for the OC-6 and OC-12.

Kawika Smith, 15, was going for his second World Sprints. He'll also have to try again in April after finishing third yesterday.

His mother, Tammy Smith, is used to watching her two sons face the rigors of competition. But as a paddling mom, she participates in some of the more strenuous aspects of international racing - chaperoning teen-age crews and fund-raising.

The cost of the week-long Australia trip is estimated to be about $1,300 per racer.

Qualifiers were: Tresnak Jr., John Roberson, Nappy Napoleon, Steve Cole, Kenny Powell, Monica Seager and Donna Kahakui. Also, Michelle Higashi, Kaena Apana, Nahina Lee-Loy, Justin Akana, Anela Borges, Dariel Hoapili, Keoni Akaka-Reis, Karen Evans, Michael Beyer and Kai Bartlett.