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David Hearn’s Olympic JournalWhitewater Journey
Greetings from the whitewater world!
I got started canoeing with my family on the Potomac
River near Washington, DC. My dad enjoyed canoeing and introduced all of us to
the sport as soon as we could swim. One
of my earliest paddling memories is of overnight camping trips we took via open
canoe on the Missouri River in Montana, where Carter and Mary Alice would sit
at each end of the canoe, and Cathy and I, age 4 and 5, sat in the middle of
the boat. Sometimes we would try to
help paddle with our small canoe paddles, but I remember dragging stuff like
our paddles and socks as the canoe glided across the water. Cathy and I liked to watch the small
whirlpools that formed behind our paddles.
Of course this made my father mad sometimes because we were slowing down
the boat, but he always let us experience the outdoors and have fun doing it.
My family traveled across country by car each summer
to my father Carter’s geological field area in Montana. My mother Mary Alice, older sister Cathy,
and younger brother Bill were all along for eight or ten weeks as he did field
work for the U.S. Geological Survey. It
would take us about three or four days to drive across the United States in our
station wagon loaded up with boats on the roof. My sister and I learned to enjoy these road trips pretty early
on. In 1972, we were driving along a
dusty Montana back road listening to the radio when we heard that Jamie McEwan
of Silver Spring, Maryland had just won the bronze medal in whitewater slalom
canoe at the Munich Olympics. We all
went crazy with excitement because we knew Jamie personally and had been
canoeing with him through our local canoeing club, the CCA. Cathy and I were
both inspired by Jamie’s awesome
performance and we became eager to paddle more often and began to think about
training for whitewater slalom racing.
I had started to paddle a junior decked canoe (a 3/4
size C1; I liked it because that was the kind of boat my dad paddled) and my sister
Cathy paddled a kayak. We would canoe and kayak with our local club, the Canoe
Cruisers Association of Greater Washington, DC on the Potomac and other streams
nearby. My dad would often go paddling,
and sometimes we didn’t want to go because we didn’t want to get wet and cold
that day, but that was okay. We were
never pressured to go paddling when we didn’t want to. Our parents made it clear that it was up to
us to decide how to spend our time, but both Cathy and I wanted to excel at
something. Cathy worked at a camp,
Valley Mill, in the summer of 1974, where ‘72 Olympians Jamie McEwan and Angus
Morrison worked. She ran some rivers in
West Virginia that summer with them, and got ready to train seriously. Her excitement rubbed of on me when I returned
from the western trip that September.
Cathy got her driver’s license in that fall of 1974,
and we were able to get to the Potomac each day after school. We would boat on the river with friends Kent
Ford, Mike and Steve Garvis, Bob Robison, Tom McGowan, the McCormick brothers,
and the Lugbills. Cathy was able to
arrange for gym credit for her paddling and get out of school an hour
earlier. I was initially turned down
for this option by the boys PE dept., so I got the girls' gym dept. to give me
credit for my after school canoe training!
I started keeping a training log at this time as one of the requirements
to show that I was putting in my PE time, which got me even more determined to
excel at whitewater slalom. I still
keep a daily training log and have all of my logs since 1976. These logs are kind of cool because I can
look up what kind of workouts I was doing, where I was, how I felt, how much
sleep I got, and how I did in the competitions. I can always continue to experiment with my training and learn
new things while consulting my previous training logs for trends. When the river level changes I know where
the best surfing play spots are from this detailed record.
The great thing about whitewater sport is that it
can be enjoyed for a lifetime. Last
month I celebrated my 37th birthday, and with almost thirty years of whitewater
experience, including being a member of the United States Whitewater Team since
1977, it has been an amazing odyssey. I
made the U.S. Wildwater Team for the first time in C2 (doubles canoe) with Ron
Lugbill. We won a bronze medal in the
World Championships Wildwater Team event where three boats race down the rapids
together.
In 1976 many of the top whitewater racers like Jamie
McEwan and Angus Morrison tried their skills at flatwater sprint racing to try
and go to the Olympics again. The
whitewater slalom events have only been part of the Olympics in 1972, 1992, and
now 1996. The departure of these
skilled C1 athletes from the slalom scene made room for the Potomac River
after-school crowd. About this same
time, Bill Endicott began coaching us on a regular basis. Endicott, an alternate to the 1972 Olympic
Team, volunteered his time as the U.S. Whitewater Team Coach for about fifteen
years.
I made the U.S. Whitewater Slalom Team in 1979. The United States swept the C1 class that
year when Jon Lugbill won the World Championships, I earned a silver medal, and
Bob Robison placed third. The USA C1s
led by Jon Lugbill and I dominated our class at the World Championships (held
in every odd numbered year) from 1979 to 1989.
During that decade, Lugbill won the World Championships five times, and
I won the silver in each of those years, until 1985 when I won the worlds and Lugbill
placed second. Jon Lugbill and I,
paired with various other C1s were undefeated in the World Championship Slalom
Team event from 1979 to 1989.
After the 1989 Savage River World Championships in
Western Maryland, we learned that
whitewater slalom would back on the Olympic program for the 1992 Games in
Spain. Twenty years after his
awe-inspiring medal run, Jamie McEwan was still competing, this time in the C2
(doubles canoe) class with Lecky Haller.
They placed fourth in La Seu d’Urgell, Spain, and the team of Scott
Strausbaugh and Joe Jacobi won the Olympic gold medal. The United States C1s were out of the medals
with Jon Lugbill placing fourth, and I finished in 11th place. Dana Chladek brought home a bronze medal in
the K1W (women’s kayak) class and Cathy Hearn was 9th. The U.S. whitewater results were met with
mixed reviews. Everyone was excited
when Scott and Joe won the gold medal and Dana won the bronze. People wondered if it was time for the
formerly dominating American C1s to step aside for some of the hot young
European athletes. I didn’t think
so. Whitewater training and racing is
still fun for me, and I felt like I was always learning new techniques and
still improving. I made the decision to
train for Atlanta in 1996 at the closing ceremonies in Barcelona, resolving to improve
upon my disappointing result there.
Whitewater slalom athletes have competed in World
Cup competitions each year since 1988, and the World Championships every odd
numbered year. The International Canoe
Federation (ICF) adopted a World Ranking system in 1993 which uses the athletes
best 3 of the last 5 World Cup or World Championship qualifying results to
calculate overall ranking. A
significant change to the sport was made in 1993 when the World Championships
and World Cup events went to a qualifying system. Athletes in each of the four classes: K1, C1, K1W, and C2, had to
place in the top one third of the class or top fifteen boats respectively in
the qualifier events. Athletes are
given one practice run and two race runs down the course; the better of the two
runs counts. In the World Cup finals or
World Championships the course is modified, the athletes do not get a practice
run on the new course, and are allowed only their two race runs, with the best
of the two runs counting.
This new qualifying format was something that
everyone had to get used to quickly in order to continue to do well. During the 1993 World Championships in
Mezzana, Italy there were many good boats that didn’t make it into the finals. Many athletes thought it was kind of
unbelievable, especially in the K1 (men’s kayak class) where 15 athletes could
be within 3 seconds of each other, and any one of those top athletes had a
chance at winning the race. The
cut-throat qualifying system has made the sport more exciting and dramatic for
competitors and spectators alike.
After three years of practice at these
qualifying
Worlds races, it made it a little easier when the United States and other
countries had to qualify boats for the 1996 Olympic Games. The 1995 World Championships in Nottingham,
England was the first of two Olympic Qualifiers. Jon Lugbill and I earned the maximum two Olympic starting
positions for the United States in the C1 class. My sister Cathy earned a K1W Olympic slot. Scott Shipley and Eric Giddens earned the
two starting positions in the K1 class.
These U.S. positions are for number of boats per class only. The actual
Olympic Team athletes will be selected at the U.S. Team Trials on May 18 and 19
on the Ocoee River in Tennessee. We
just had the second Olympic qualifying event and UPS World Cup on the Ocoee
River Olympic course on April 19-21.
Kara Weld earned a second American K1W Olympic starting position, and
brothers Fritz and Lecky Haller placed third in the qualifier to earn a C2
start. The United States will have a
total of 8 athletes competing in 7 boats at the Whitewater Games: two C1, two K1W, two K1, and one C2. The U.S. Olympic Team Trials in ten days will determine which athletes will get to “go to the show.” Whitewater slalom athletes will need to win the race on Saturday (in all four classes) or on Sunday (C1, K1W, and K1 only) to make the 1996 Olympic Team. I will have more behind the scenes whitewater slalom coverage on the Olympic Team Trials. Stay tuned for more tales of whitewater action.
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Copyright © Maximum Whitewater Performance 2005
This website and all content within are property of MWP unless otherwise noted Last updated: January 18, 2006 |
