New Zealand elite paddler Max Brown relished the chance to drop back from his high performance duties to race at the Blue Lakes 2 Sprint Kayak Regatta in Rotorua with his old Whanganui clubmate Toby Brooke at the weekend.
The pair spearheaded a squad from the kyak division of the Whanganui Multisport Club competing at the second largest regatta on the New Zealand sprint kayak calendar behind the nationals at Lake Karapiro.
The Blue Lakes regatta featered star studded fields racing with the fields including the open women's team members, some of whom had already achieved multiple Olympic and World Championship successes. Along with the golden girls of the sport, the fast developing men's open high performance team was also in attendance.
The high performance team, including Whanganui's own Max Brown, train out of Cambridge and were relishing the chance to compete in the club based regatta.
Brown and Brooke remain undefeated after the weekend in the open division two person team when they clearly won the K2 1000m by over a boat length. But their team boat performance was not the only event for the Whanganui club as the U14yr boat made up of Angus Sewell and Zane Mills-Nossiter showed a clean pair of heels over both 200m and 500m journeys, while the U18 boat of Lucas Thompson and Jack Clifton snuck home ahead of a stacked composite crew in the shorter 200m event and were second in the 1000m race.