Ella Beere has continued her domination of the under-18 women’s events at the National Canoe Sprint Championships in Perth on Saturday by winning a third gold medal.
The 17-year-old combined with Illawarra paddler Jayde Bagnall to win the K2 200 final in 42.37, 0.52 seconds ahead of K2 500 victors Ruby Backen and Caitlin Burt-Poloai.
“We got second in the K2 500 so we were really looking to win that one and we are really happy,” Bagnall said.
“We are really stoked because every race we do we seem to improve every time so it was really good to get the win,” Beere added.
For Beere, the victory takes her Nationals medal tally to four after she won gold in the women’s under-18 K1 200 and K1 500 finals, and silver in the K2 500.
2016 shapes as a big year for the surf lifesaving convert who is aiming to win a medal at the ICF Junior World Championships in August.
“I am looking forward to going overseas and hopefully, I might get a medal in one of the events because I came seventh last year in the 200 so I want to do a bit better than that this year,” Beere said.
Beere has drawn a lot of inspiration this week from fellow Avoca paddlers Lachlan Tame and Riley Fitzsimmons who earned the right to be nominated to the Australian Olympic Committee following their results in the 1000 metre men’s events.
“They are so good to look up to. They are going so well and they are Olympians now so I definitely look up to them a lot,” Beere said.
Similar to Beere, Bagnall likes to model her paddling on two London Olympians.
“I really look up to the Sydney Northern Beaches girls, mainly Naomi Flood and Jo Brigden-Jones because I have trained with them so we kind of know them personally and they are absolute legends,” Bagnall said.
After competing on the Olympic Hopes team in 2014 Bagnall took a year off from paddling in 2015 but is looking forward to racing on the junior team this year.
“I am looking to improve my performances in team boats this year and I am looking forward to training with the other girls,” Bagnall said.
“I think it would be a really great experience going overseas and we will have a lot of fun.”
