Durban teen up for World Paddling award
18-year-old Kyeta Purchase has been nominated for the World Paddle Awards after some impressive performances over the last two years.
Purchase, who’s busy writing her Matric finals at Our Lady of Fatima School, has achieved a lot in just two years devoted to paddling. She most recently competed at the Canoe Marathon World Championships in Germany in September and claimed a bronze medal in the K1 Junior Girls finals. She then grabbed silver alongside fellow South African paddler Jenna Ward in the Women’s K2 final.
According to Purchase, those two achievements in particular have earned her a shot at the junior World Paddler Award.
“I think it’s the first time that a junior has won a senior medal at the World Champs so I think I was nominated purely on that,” Purchase told ECRSportswave this week.
She’s up against a four other paddlers from different disciplines for the Sports Junior award. Votes are accumulated on the World Paddle Awards website. To vote for Purchase, follow the link and click the like button at the bottom of the page. You can also vote by clicking the Facebook and Google+ like buttons.
http://www.worldpaddleawards.com/nominees/2016-kyeta-purchase-south-africa
You can also vote for Hank Mcgregor, who is up for the Sportsman award. Another South African, Kim Pople, is up for the Foundation Award.
From swimming to paddling
Purchase’s involvement in paddling started in the water. As an avid swimmer, she trained from a young age until she was introduced to Lifesaving. Moving through Nippers and Junior Lifesaving, she was eventually introduced to the paddling events of the sport.
“When you go from Nippers to Juniors, you have to start on a surfski and a lot of people don’t do that so they miss out on three disciplines in the competition,” Purchase explained.
The 18-year-old started training with Lee Mcgregor, father of paddling legend Hank, ahead of the World Lifesaving Competition in France in 2014.
“I trained with him, which really improved my paddling and when I got home from the competition he asked me to give two years of my life to try and earn a World medal in paddling,” she said.
“I gave up swimming, stopped everything else and gave my all to paddling.”
In 2015, she ended up in fourth place at the Canoe World Champs, a result which she was highly disappointed with. With that result fueling the fire, she managed her bronze and silver medal finishes in September.
“This year we came back fighting, trained even harder and grabbed third and second in those events. Since then I’ve loved paddling and I’ve been doing it in surfski, river, marathons and sprints – all different disciplines because Lee got me into the sport,” Purchase said.
Training with legends
Purchase has been able to draw a lot of knowledge from the likes of Hank Mcgregor and her World Champs K2 partner Jenna Ward. She admitted that their input has been massive for her development as a paddler.
“It definitely has been an advantage. When you have a conversation with Hank, he just knows so much about everything. It’s amazing to see how he analyses a race, or tells you how certain things should be done. He is in complete control of his race and knows what’s going to happen and when – it’s nice to learn from someone who has done so much in paddling,” Purchase said.
“Having his dad coaching me is really cool, because he has coached a World Champion in Hank.”
Purchase recently started training with Ward and said they formed an excellent partnership on the water.
“When we got into a boat together we just clicked. She has shown me so many tactics, and I leave all my trust in her when we paddle together because she’s amazing in Marathons, she knows exactly what she is doing.”
Targeting the 2017 World Champs
With the 2017 Canoe Marathon World Champs in Pietermaritzburg, Purchase is hoping for another podium finish as she moves into the U23 age group.
She will be taking a gap year to focus on training and hopes to take advantage of the competition being on South Africa soil.
Purchase is sponsored Fenn Kayaks, Eurosteel Sport, Mocké Paddling and the Elite Athlete Development Programme.
Photo credit: Balint Vekassy/ICF/ Gameplan Media
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