Full steam ahead for Anne Cairns on the water
Manawatu¯ paddler Anne Cairns has launched into another busy year of competition on the water.
The firefighter had a successful start to the year at the national waka ama championships last month and is having a hectic February, racing in four different boats.
She raced in the Coast to Coast multisport event in the South Island last weekend in a Cairns family team. Her father Lawrie, 73, did the run, brother Craig the bike and Cairns the paddling. Sister Bridget handled logistics and support.
They finished fifth in the family section for the two-day event from Kumara, on the West Coast, over to Christchurch in 18hr 54min 50sec.
This week, Cairns headed to Lake Karapiro for the Oceania and New Zealand sprint kayak championships, where she represented Samoa in the women’s K1 200m yesterday.
Today she will join the open team of her waka ama club, Haeata Ocean Sports, taking on the Takapuna Cup event. It is New Zealand’s only waka ama changeover race, involving a 42-kilometre paddle race from Takapuna Beach.
She was part of the women’s team Manuz and Jemimaz that won the title for the past two years, so it will be a new challenge to compete in the mixed event.
Tomorrow, she will switch to a single waka to race in the 24km relay event, where teams of two complete three 4km laps each.
It has been a great start to the year for Cairns, winning two golds, a silver, a bronze and a fourth place at the recent New Zealand waka ama championships at Lake Karapiro.
The race of the championships was the premier women’s 1500m W6 final, where her team MJS (Haeata Ocean Sports) pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the nationals to win gold.
Qualifying second for the final, 15 seconds behind top qualifiers, the nine-time national title winners and current world club champions Kaiarahi Toa, from Gisborne, MJS stuck with them and went on to dominate the race in a strong showing that surprised everyone.
‘‘We knew we could improve on our semifinal performance if we tidied up our turns and really focused on putting our power into the same part of each stroke. It’s definitely one of the if not the most satisfying paddle races I have ever been part of,’’ Cairns said.
The other medals were silver in premier women’s W6 500m, premier women’s W12 500m, and the second gold came in the women’s regional 500m race competing for Te Uranga o Te Ra (Hawke’s Bay-gisborne).
Cairns will compete at the waka ama long-distance national championships in Auckland at Easter, where their MJS team will try for their ninth premier women’s title.
Cairns turned down racing with the New Zealand waka ama team for the world championships on the Gold Coast in August, and the New Zealand rafting team for the world champs in Queensland. That was partly due to financial and work factors, and also based on her commitment to other events, including the world sprint kayak championships in Hungary in August – a must to qualify for the 2020 Olympics.
There is also a return to Hawaii in September for more waka ama racing, and possibly the world ocean surf ski championships in France in September.