Kayaking: Fouhy ends silence over campaign against him

Ben Fouhy says he is the third kayaker to suffer a selection dispute with Steven Ferguson. Photo / Kenny Rodger

When Ben Fouhy stepped away from kayaking last week he decided not to talk, knowing that getting into a war of words with the Fergusons, the first family of New Zealand kayaking, was a public relations battle he could not win.

But after what he feels has been an orchestrated campaign of misinformation between Canoe Racing New Zealand and Sparc, the Government's high-performance sport funding agency, Fouhy has spoken out.

"I am speaking out now because it's important that other athletes coming through should not fear having their integrity questioned and name muddied for having a difference of opinion," Fouhy told the Herald.

"Sparc's announcement around my funding in 2009 created an unfair perception that I had been deceptive. I met with Sparc last year to try and give back the funding, which they would not accept. Sparc vetoed me racing last year's World Cup because I hadn't qualified at nationals, hence my longer-than-planned sabbatical. This was Sparc's choice, not mine."

Sparc high-performance boss Marty Toomey yesterday announced that they were pulling Fouhy's funding, close to $50,000 per year in PEG grants, following his decision not to compete at the world champs.

"There was no expectation that funding would be continued post my recent decision," Fouhy said. "There has been no rug pulled from under my feet."

The controversy follows Fouhy's decision to walk away from the sport after falling out with CRNZ, and by proxy the Fergusons, national coach and selector Ian and fellow paddler Steven, over the selection process for the K1 1000m.

"I elected not to participate in the K1 1000m trials because I felt to do so would legitimise what I felt was a flawed and compromised selection process," Fouhy said.

"Everyone in kayaking who has dared to express an alternative view to Ian Ferguson has been publicly dismissed with trivial name calling and had their talent or character undermined. The actual issues have never been properly addressed."

New Zealand's kayaking community is a small one.

Herald inquiries have unearthed an undercurrent of dissatisfaction with the way the sport is being dominated by a couple of big personalities but few, if any, are prepared to go on record.

One source said: "If the Fergusons are your ticket to the Olympics, you're hardly going to cross them."

One person prepared to speak out was Max Walker, father of Olympian Mike and a man who has butted heads on more occasions than he would care to recall with the sport's administrators. He said nobody was blameless in the affair.

"This is great entertainment for the public, but there has to be a better way out of this. This is just bullshit," he said.

"I'm happy to go on record and say Ben is a difficult character. He's stroppy, he's intense, he's headstrong, but those sort of qualities are pretty bloody handy when you hit 950m in a K1 1000m race.

"What sport in New Zealand can afford to say goodbye to someone who is in the top five in the world and that's what Ben still is.

"You've got to look after him, you've got to listen to him. You can't just bully him around, which is what they've tried to do."

During the weekend, Ian Ferguson, whose four Olympic gold and one silver medals have earned him a spot in the pantheon of New Zealand sporting greats, intimated kayaking was better off without Fouhy and made mention of his propensity for throwing tantrums.

The personal attack left Fouhy stunned.

"I have always been very grateful for the opportunities Ian Ferguson gave me with his support, particularly in 2003. Out of respect for this I have always chosen not to publicly comment in a derogatory manner towards Ian or his son Steven," Fouhy said.

However, the Taumarunui-raised paddler said he was the third kayaker to suffer in a selection dispute with Steven Ferguson.

During the Athens Olympics, Owen Hughes fired off an angry email to media after Ferguson went on a go-slow in the K1 500m to save his energy for the K2. Hughes believed he should have been given the K1 spot.

In 2005, Nic Riosa took CRNZ to the Sports Dispute Tribunal after Ferguson won a spot at the World Marathon Champs in Perth ahead of him. The tribunal upheld CRNZ's decision but criticised the national body for its poor communication of selection criteria.

What has galled Fouhy the most about his selection dispute is that New Zealand will have no entrant in the K1 1000m.

"Steven Ferguson compared the proposed K1 1000m trial to Mahe Drysdale and Rob Waddell pre-Beijing, yet when given the spot he has elected not to race it."

At the heart of the dispute is the timing of the national trials and Fouhy's belief that CRNZ did not have to make them the be-all and end-all for selection for the world champs, to be held in Poland in August.

He felt with three months' training under his belt, he was at a significant disadvantage to Ferguson and could have missed selection for Europe.

That would have left him only one European season (2011) to prepare for the London Olympics and Fouhy believed it would have been pointless trying to mount a decent campaign with such a limited body of work behind him.

The 31-year-old wanted, if Ferguson was actually committed to the K1, for both of them to attend the world cup regattas in Europe. CRNZ instead elected to hold a trial this month and send just one paddler.

"When you consider that the sole objective of CRNZ is to win medals at the Olympics, perhaps you can understand why I feel that to potentially eliminate the only person who has won a medal in the past 20 years based simply on the timing of trials, which CRNZ had full control over, seemed futile.

"[However] I accepted CRNZ's stance on the matter, realised the writing was on the wall about what an uphill battle it would be get to medal standard with this kind of custodianship, and decided on balance to take myself out of the mix and to quietly move on with my life.

"CRNZ will endeavour to put their own spin, justifications and interpretations of selection rules on all of this, as they have at every contentious point in the past. I can only trust that my track record of honesty and world-class performances counts for something in peoples' judgments."

Fouhy said he had competed in a combined 22 world cup, world championship and Olympic races and had missed the podium just seven times.

"I have never been outside of top five at a world championship final in the K1."

It's those sort of statistics that has Walker shaking his head at the lunacy of the dispute.

"I can't believe that this hasn't gone to mediation and I happen to blame Sparc," Walker said. "Their stance has left no light at the end of the tunnel. They seem to think selection criteria is a great god that cannot be moved.

"It's a nonsense. If Ben was to focus and had the right people around him, he could front up and win a medal in London."

BEN FOUHY

* Fouhy took up kayaking seriously in 2002, following his interest in multisport events.
* In 2003, he won the world K1 1000m champs in Gainesville, Georgia.
* The following year he won silver at the Athens Olympics.
* After the Olympics he announced he was taking a break from kayaking to try cycling.
* In 2006, he finished third at the world champs in Szeged, Hungary.
* At the Beijing Olympics he finished fourth.