The Flesk Race

T-wave rodeo was a great success and spurred Colin Wong to organise the next event down in county kerry on his local run the flesk.

Kerry has some amazing rivers and the flesk is one of the best Ireland has to offer. The race took place on the middle Flesk, from the gates to the eddy above pollgorm bridge. This is 2km of class 4-5 whitewater and was most definitely going to be a challenge.

(first gorge)

December 3nd came and the levels were right making the race a good to go. Toby Orky and I loaded up the van and headed south. We arrived at the flesk a little bit late but still got to fit in a practice run. This was well

needed, to brush up on the memory of all the lines as it had been quite some time since I was on this river.

(myself on triple step)

There was a great turn out at the race with over 30 paddlers on the water and over 14 competitors of Ireland's top paddlers. With all the safety set up the first heat got under way, paddlers who weren't in the first heat had to do safety. This gave me a chance to get in a second run.

I was the 3rd up in the second heat and Colin was the last to race. My run went pretty well with only one small cock up. It was the first time running this river solo which was a bit intimidating but all the main rapids had safety so there was nothing to worry about. I made it down to the end and across the line.

(Colin )

There was very little between the times but at the end of the day Neil Slevin was crowned king of the Flesk with an impressive 12minutes and 7 seconds, closely followed by Colin Wong, only a second off the pace. full results are below.

1st - Neil Slevin 12.07

2nd - Colin Wong 12.08

3rd - Toby Fischer 12.15

4th - Paddy Mc Govern 12.16

5th - Barry Loughnane 12.25

6th - Eoin keyes 12.30

7th - David O Sullivan 12.32

8th - Sean Mc Ternan 13.04

9th - (John) Orky O'Rourke 13.10

10th - Andrew Regan 13.29

11th - Dave David Glasswell 13.35

12th - Andre Brodkorb 14.26

13th - Colm Johnson 16.29

14th - Brian Cahill n/a

The race (and after party) was a great success and hopefully will inspire more events like this around the country.

Thanks again to Colin Wong and Snax for organising this event and hopefully we will see this happen again next year.