Carleton Place-based kayaker Willows is named to world championship team
Posted Jul 29, 2010 By Jeff Maguire
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Tweet ThisEMC Sports - Veteran kayaker Andrew Willows continues to excel as he works to reach his goal of competing for Canada in a third straight Summer Olympic Games.
Last week the Carleton Place-based paddler was once again named to the Canadian team for the World Canoe and Kayak Championships which will be held in Poznan, Poland Aug. 19-22.
Last August the Gananoque native and his long-time paddling partner Richard Dober Jr. of Trois-Rivières, Quebec claimed third place bronze in the men's K-2 (kayak pairs) 200 metre sprint event at the world championships which were staged in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.
Dober was also among a dozen athletes named to the men's kayak team last week. The squad is led by three-time Olympic medalist Adam van Koeverden of Oakville, Ont. and Mark Oldershaw of Burlington, Ont. Also named to the kayak team are Ottawa paddlers Angus Mortimer, Rhys Hill and Corey Hamilton.
Ottawa's Kristin Gauthier is among six kayakers named to the Canadian women's team for next month's worlds.
The squad, which also includes eight canoeists (six men and two women) and four paracanoe athletes, was finalized July 19 following a weekend of national team trials held in Montreal.
"We have a good mix of veterans and youngsters," says Graham Barton of Stittsville, the sprint high performance director for Canoe Kayak Canada based in Ottawa.
"Adam and Mark will be our biggest medal threats. But the times and performances this season have shown we are going in with a very competitive team."
Barton is a former coach at the Carleton Place Canoe Club (CPCC). His teenage son Nathan is currently a high performance kayaker who trains at CPCC.
Van Koeverden has enjoyed a strong start to the 2010 season earning five World Cup medals this spring in events held in Europe.
As for Willows, he was thrilled with his performance in last summer's worlds.
It was the second world championship medal for Willows and Dober who won silver in the K-2, 500 metres (m) at the 2006 worlds in Szeged, Hungary.
Willows and his wife Valerie built a home just outside Carleton Place 18 months ago. As a teenager he was a paddler at the CPCC while attending high school in the town.
The 30-year-old, who also has family in Carleton Place, continues to do some of his training on the Mississippi River course as well in Ottawa and Montreal.
The veteran kayaker, who is known for his strong work ethic along with his personality and strong public relations skills, is considered an excellent role model for young athletes wherever his training schedule takes him. He is highly regarded at his alma mater, the historic CPCC.
"Andrew is so good with the kids," says Carleton Place commodore Jim Hicks.
At last year's worlds in Nova Scotia, Willows also teamed with three other Canadian paddlers in the K-1 relay race. They shared a very respectable fifth place finish.
Willows international paddling dream is obviously alive and well. One of his main goals is a third Summer Olympic appearance in London, England in 2012.
In August 2008 Willows and Dober finished a strong sixth in the highly competitive K-2, 500m at the Summer Olympic Games in Beijing, China. Despite the disappointment of failing to make the podium, the pair had the satisfaction of knowing they were a scant nine-tenths of a second from Olympic glory.
With a time of one minute, 30.857 seconds Willows and Dober finished only slightly behind the gold medal winning crew of Saul Craviotto and Carlos Perez from Spain, the same paddlers who finished just ahead of them in Dartmouth last summer.
The Canadian pair's sixth place finish in the K-2, 500m in China was the best result by a Canadian crew in that particular event in 24 years. The team of Hugh Fisher and Alwyn Morris from Wakefield, Quebec, just north of Ottawa, won the bronze medal at the 1984 games in Los Angeles. However, 1984 was the year Eastern Bloc countries, including Russia, boycotted the Olympics which meant many of the best athletes in the world did not compete.
Willows overcame the pain of a nagging disc problem in his back to compete in his second consecutive Olympic games in Beijing. Four summers before, in Athens (2004), he and Dober, along with Ryan Cuthbert of Carleton Place and Steve Jorens of Aurora, Ontario qualified for the final in the K-4, 1000m event but finished a disappointing ninth.
The foursome eventually decided to abandon the K-4 boat and turn their efforts to kayak doubles instead.
Cuthbert, a Carleton Place native, has since retired from competitive paddling and has taken on a new career in policing.
Willows told the EMC in an earlier interview that he feels the Olympics are over-rated. He backs up his contention with some interesting facts and figures.
"Sometimes the toughest thing at the Olympics is dealing with all the hype.
"The worlds are far more competitive," he said before heading to Nova Scotia for last year's championships.
Willows points to Beijing 2008 as a good example of what he means.
"In China there were 24 (entrants) in the K-2. It's far more limited. At the worlds this year (2009) there will be 53. That's more than double (Beijing).
Instead of three boats qualifying in the semi finals (finalists are determined during heats) there were just two in Dartmouth last summer.
"The competition is much tougher at the worlds," Willows underlines. "Getting to the final is difficult."
Still, the two-time Olympian readily admits the prestige of winning Olympic gold is "pretty hard to beat." Therefore he is taking dead aim at a spot in the 2012 London games, even though he'll be 32 years old at the time which is considered old for a high performance kayaker.
"That's what I am looking at right now," he acknowledges.
Last summer's world championship bronze in Nova Scotia marked the 22nd international medal for Willows and Dober who have been paddling together competitively since 2005.
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