GB Canoe Slalom Team visit London 2012 White Water Canoe Centre
Date Published: 26/11/2009
The GB Canoe Slalom team will visit the London 2012 White Water Canoe Centre on Monday 30th November for the first time. Lee Valley Regional Park Authority – which will own, fund and manage the venue – welcome the visit and are delighted to be hosting the team.
Among the talented athletes attending are David Florence (Olympic Silver medallist from Beijing) and Lizzie Neave (2009 World Championship Bronze Medallist and World and European Gold medallist in the women’s kayak single (K1) canoe slalom event).
BCU High Performance Manager, Andy Maddock said:“This is the first all new facility in the UK for 15 years and with work now well underway on this showpiece venue, it is an exciting time for athletes to experience and visualise the structure taking shape. For many competing athletes, the knowledge that this is a Home Olympic Games adds another exciting dimension and truly is a unique opportunity for us.”
The visit will enable the GB team to gauge the scope of the venue and assess the site that will become their home – when it opens to the public ahead of the Games in 2011. The athletes will base themselves at the White Water Canoe Centre (in Hertfordshire, just north of the M25 between Waltham Abbey and Waltham Cross) and begin a rigorous training programme from Spring 2011 when Lee Valley Regional Park Authority open the venue for the general public and elite athletes to use. As well as being used by the public who can freely raft and canoe the rapids before the Olympians begin in 2012, it will be put through its paces in pre-Games training and test events.
This is the only brand new 2012 Olympic venue to open to the public ahead of the London 2012 Games and will serve not only the elite athletes but also the local community. It will be the first brand new London 2012 Games venue to be completed and will be a major centre for white water rafting as well as canoeing and kayaking after the Games. Shaun Dawson, Chief Executive at Lee Valley Regional Park Authority welcomes the GB athletes’ tour and said:
“We are delighted to welcome Team GB and show them and their coaches the progress that has been made across the site. We welcome the team to this excellent venue, which opens before the Games. Lee Valley will ensure it is well used by a wide range of people from the elite canoeists to people who’ve never paddled before. The Centre will open again shortly after the Games and we are expecting 70,000 visitors per year - most of them taking up the challenge of white water rafting. We’ll also be providing canoeing sports development opportunities for clubs, colleges, universities, schools and community groups.”
Construction work on the site started in July this year and is set for completion at the beginning of 2011. It will be owned, funded and managed by the Lee Valley Regional Park Authority before and after the London 2012 Olympic Games.