Laurence Fletcher
Age 18Sport Played Flatwater Sprint Kayaking
Years Played 9 years
Tell us about yourself
My name is Laurence Fletcher; I live in the coastal suburb of Semaphore South Australia. I am 18 years of age and have been competing in the sport of flatwater sprint kayaking for nine years and I’m hoping to achieve international success at the Junior Sprint Canoe World Championships in Moscow later in 2009.I am currently on scholarship with the South Australian Sports Institute (SASI) and recently competed at the National Flatwater Championships. At this race meeting I was very successful and was selected as part of the Junior Australian kayak team with my K2 partner. We will compete at the Junior World Championships in Moscow, Russia late July, season 2009.
I am currently in my final year of study and I’m aiming to continue my studies at a Tertiary level in 2010, hopefully in Human Movement. I became a member of the Semaphore SLSC 3 years ago and have had considerable success in my Age groups at the National level and open and age group success in my state surf life saving level. At State associations I made winning finals in the age group single ski, double ski, ski relay and Taplin relay. At the National championships I made the same finals finishing just outside the points in all events.
Proudest Sporting Achievements
During my 9 years of competition in Kayaking I have won twenty three national titles and attained many silver and bronze medals. Below are some of my most recent results from the existing 08/09 sprint season:1st place in both the u/18 K2 (pairs) 500m and K2 1000m at GP1 and GP2 and selection to Australian youth Olympic team, and the K2 team position with my partner Jeremy Petho on the Australian Youth Olympic team to compete At the Youth Olympics in January.
Jeremy and I competed for Australia at the Youth Olympics and achieved first place in both the K2 500m and the K2 1000m, winning two youth Olympic gold’s. I also competed in the K4 500m gaining a bronze medal.
Jeremy and I paired up once again at the National Championships held in WA in March. We both gained selection to the Junior Australian Kayak team after winning the u/18 K2 1000m and K2 500m being the National Champions in both distances, we both also won three more gold in the u/18 K4 1000m, 500m and 200m. Jeremy picked up a silver medal in the u/18 K1 1000m, and I achieved bronze in the u/18 k1 500m.
What are you hoping to achieve
As kayakers the K2 is our biggest strength and that being the case we will be striving for a medal at the Junior World Championships, and then train on to represent Australia at the next Olympics but more realistically in 2016. On the way to achieving that goal we aim to taste success at more State and National level Kayak events and Surf Life saving events in an effort to keep testing ourselves against the best in both disciplines.My Blog
17/05/10
At the National championships, i raced well in my distance of 200m, just missing out on the B final by less than a second, this was a low for myself at nationals, but due to the strong competition it gave me a bench mark to work off of for the coming season.
In the K2 200m i finished 8th in the A final which was a good achievement, i maintained my scholarship with the South Australian Sports Institute and had a 6 week break from training.
A the moment we are back into our second week of training, we are only paddling 3 times a week at the moment, with three gyms and three cross trainings. The long linebreak compression tights have been very handy for the early morning bike rides in keeping my legs warm and assisting the circulation and recovery afterwards.
At nationals i found the long sleeve linebreak compression top to be very handy after races i would put it on and try to leave it on for as long as possible between or after completion of races.
Ahead in the training schedule the number of sessions will step up, we're currently training 9 times a week as a squad after the first month this will more than likely go to 12 as some more paddling sessions and swimming is included.
01/01/10
Since December their have been a lot of changes to my paddling and circumstances, i was offered my scholarship again with the South Australian Sports Institute, and have continued training at the elite level. We had our first national competition in December (GP1), which was held here in Adelaide. This was my first race in which I was in the Open age group. I placed well in 200m K1 event, (singles) coming 6th in the B Final.
Up until about three weeks from now i have been training in the 1000m training squad which involves a lot of endurance and aerobic training, we trained on the Murray river three to four times a day. at this training camp my paddle was broken. I am now getting a new paddle.
Now i have been onto the 200m training program, which being shorter requires different training to that of the 1000m. So I have now switched to sprinting and everything i do is shorter with an emphasis on strength and speed. Matt Goble and I are the only two males in South Australia on this sprint program, we are solely training together everyday in the gym and paddling. it is great training with Matt as he is the best in Australia so if i can be close to him i may be the second best.
That is all that is new in paddling, we are currently training for the National Championships held in Sydney in March. Their is the second GP coming up in February at Sydney as well that I will be attending.
13/8/09
The compression gear i received before leaving was amazing. i took all items away with me, and told everyone about them, i primarily used the items for recovery after training sessions and during competition for recovery. as their are strict rules and guidelines on apparel when racing i was unable to wear the items whilst racing as i must wear the exact same as my K2 partners clothing, so we raced in purely AUS uniform. but the linebreak compression gear was on straight after for recovery, one of the main times i used and praised it was for the long all up 20 hour flight. i wore the long leggings and top to reduce jetlag, i have not done such a long flight before so i cant compare, but i certainly didnt feel jet lagged when there.
i have a few pictures to send that are from my camera of linebreak i also included 2 of myself in the k2 with my partner jeremy petho, i'm in the front seat and he in the back. it was during our cooldown after a race, so we are in our racing uniform.
the weeks leading up to our departure for the junior world championships, our training started to taper off as we were trying to gain more explosive speed from our bodies, our sessions became shorter in duration yet higher in intensity. gym sessions became explosive, and paddling sessions dominated the lactic acid system.
a week out from departing to sydney for our teams training camp, i became very sick with asthma, iv suffered from severe asthma for years and years, i stopped training for that week and was constantly using strong medication to try and breath properly.
when we arrived in sydney for our training camp as a team prior to leaving to russia, the weather was significantly warmer than that of adelaide and my health started to recover quite quickly. training in sydney was of a lighter load, yet involved lots of time trials and race situation trainings. our K2 was coming along nicely and the coaches were very happy and impressed.
we left sydney after a week of training for our flight to russia, we first went to abu dhabi airport, a 16 hour flight from australia, from abu dhabi we travelled 5 hours to moscow, russia. arriving in russia was a big cultural shock as i have not been to this part of the world, it took some getting used to, and the lack of english made things a bit complicated. we settled in to russia not feeling many side affects of jet lagg, we started training the next day after a quick visit to red square. we had two days of training prior to competition, these being wednesday and thursday. with the tuesday being a very light float.
a great honour from my fellow athletes i was nominated flag bearer for australia for the opening ceremony of the junior world championships. on our first day of competing (friday) we competed in the k2 1000m, we did not make it past the heat, we had some timing issues and did not get the boat run we were after, our times were not up to our usual standards, this could of been nerves of a big race or other issues, but we ave it our best go.we had the the k2 500m heats later that arvo, we progressed through to the semi finals in this event after a slightly more settled race.
We had the saturday off competing as this was the 1000m day of semi-finals and finals which our k2 did make it to. we watched the rest of the team compete and gained sum valuable rest. on the sunday of competition, we came out all guns blazing, after a disappointing friday, we could only give it our best and hope for the best. we raced in the k2 500m semifinal, and placed 7th just missing out on progression through to the finals. this race was our best race so far. results didnt go our way, and our times werent up to our usual standards, but it was the best we could give for competition. we were quite disappointed by these results.
the rest of the trip, was played out by watching finals, after the conclusion of the regatta, we then toured moscow for the next two days and flew home. i would like to give big thanks to linebreak for your support of our efforts at juniour world championships 2009. we had high expectations of ourselves, but in the end of the day did what we could do, it just was not up to the world standard.
out of this trip we have gained valuable experience as we are only young, the senior years ahead will push us and we now know just how much harder we have to work.
22/6/09
i leave in about 4 weeks to go over seas for the junior world championships in moscow. i will keep you updated on training camps, and progress along the way.
