Sunshine Coast’s Aly Bull has defended her world title at the ICF canoe sprint and paracanoe world championships in Germany.
Bull clinched Australia’s fourth gold medal, and sixth podium place overall, on the Regattabahn Duisburg course, by retaining her K1 1000 metre crown.
The two-time Olympian finished almost two seconds ahead of her nearest competitor, Poland’s Justyna Iskrzycka.
“I’m really stoked to be able to go back-to-back in the K1 1000: it’s a challenging race and it’s pretty cool I was able to do it,” she said.
“I tend to try and not look around when I’m in a race … I just knew that there was a bit of a tail breeze on today. I really wanted to go hard from the start.
“I overcooked myself in that middle section but I was really glad to still be able to come away with a win.”
As well as Bull’s gold, Australian paddlers secured two more quota spots for the Paris 2024 Games on Saturday, courtesy of strong finals performances from Olympic gold medallist Tom Green and dual-Olympian and fellow Sunshine Coaster Alyce Wood.
Green qualified the quota spot by finishing fourth in the men’s K1 1000m final while Wood placed fifth in the women’s K1 500m.
“It’s really nice to know that I’ve been able to get a quota spot for Australia, and do that for the team,” new mum Wood said.
“I’m really happy with the race, really happy to be in the mix and happy to be able to race with those girls again.
“The really special thing is there was three of us with kids in that race, and we got third, fourth and fifth,” she said.
