Luuka Jones in action at the Canoe Slalom World Championships in Brazil. Photo / Martina Wegman
Luuka Jones in action at the Canoe Slalom World Championships in Brazil. Photo / Martina Wegman
Bay of Plenty's Mike Dawson and Luuka Jones booked semifinal appearances at the Canoe Slalom World Championships in Brazil, with contrasting performances on the third day of competition.
Dawson had a slick first run in his K1 heat, on the Rio de Janeiro course, clocking 88.81s to easily qualify 15thoverall, well inside the top-30 directly progressing to the semifinals. His time also included a two-second penalty for touching the sixth gate - without it, he would have been sixth overall.
He then comfortably qualified for the knockout stages of the extreme slalom division with the ninth-fastest time.
"I felt pretty good out there and was stoked to post a time up there with some insane competition," Dawson said.
Even with the penalty, he was just 3.94s behind reigning world champion and fastest qualifier Ondrej Tunka (Czech Republic).
Jones - who qualified for the K1 semifinals a day earlier - had a horror run in her first C1 heat, finishing 37th after picking up three early touches, then rolling near the end and missing two gates completely.
But she turned it around with a slick second run, her 110.33s effort one of the fastest runs of the day and putting her through second-fastest in the repechage.
Mike Dawson tackles the rapids at the Canoe Slalom World Cup in Brazil. Photo / Martina Wegman
"It was definitely a day of two halves but it was actually good to do a second run and get back in my groove," Jones said.
"The conditions were pretty windy which made it tricky but I was happy with a good raw time, knowing there are still some things I can tidy up as well."
The other two New Zealanders in action, Finn Butcher and Jack Dangen, missed out in the men's K1, also in contrasting fashion.
Dangen put together two good runs in his first world championship appearance - he was just one touch and a few seconds outside qualifying in his first run, finishing 44th with a 96.14s effort. He then went clean in his second run, but was slower, finishing 30th.
Butcher missed a gate and picked up a couple of touches in his first run, finishing 66th, but put together an ideal second run right until the end, when he blew the last move. It dropped him to 23rd, 5s outside the top 10 who progressed.
"I'm gutted because I just needed to hold it together through that section and it would've been golden," Butcher lamented, although he can still reflect on a breakthrough year in which he won the national championship and finished fourth in the under-23 world championships.
