New Zealand’s five-time Olympic champion Lisa Carrington is aiming to add to her record-breaking medal tally at Paris 2024. 

Canoe Sprint competition will begin on Tuesday with Carrington among the biggest names looking to create more history at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium. 

Carrington has won six Olympic medals, including five golds and one bronze. 

Three of those titles came at Tokyo 2020 where Carrington topped the podium in the women’s kayak single 200m, women’s kayak single 500m and women’s kayak double 500m. 

Only Germany’s Birgit Fischer (8), Sweden’s Gert Fredriksson (6) and Hungary’s Danuta Kozak (6) have won more Olympic golds than Carrington who is New Zealand’s most successful Olympian ever. 

Carrington said Tokyo 2020 was a “really special experience” despite competing in front of no spectators due to COVID-19 restrictions. 

“It was a tough Olympics,” said Carrington.  

“I competed in four events and came away with three gold medals.  

“I look back so fondly and think I don’t know how I did it. 

“It’s been three years since the last Olympics.  

“The team dynamic has changed a little bit.  

“We have got a few new, younger paddlers and we have been on a journey to create a really special team.  

“It’s been a really good experience to be a part of their journey.” 

Carrington will contest the women’s K1 500m, women’s K2 500m and women’s K4 500m in Paris as she eyes more Olympic glory. 

Germany, China and Poland are among the teams that will challenge New Zealand’s quartet led by Carrington. 

The 35-year-old is also set to face an almighty battle for the women’s K1 500m title with compatriot Aimee Fisher who came out on top in thrilling duals at this year’s International Canoe Federation Canoe Sprint World Cups in Szeged and Poznan. 

“Going into Paris, I have no doubt that it will be an incredible time,” said Carrington.  

“I am looking forward to the race and having some great battles with all the other countries and kind of get the most out of ourselves and out of them.  

“I think it will be awesome to race everyone at their best, so I’m looking forward to it. 

“In Paris, I’m racing the K1 500m, K2 500m and K4 500m so I am going to absolutely line up and do my best.” 

For the first time in Olympic history, there will be more women than men competing in Canoe Sprint with 120 female and 119 male paddlers lining up. 

Colombia, Chinese Taipei and Vietnam will be making their debuts in Canoe Sprint at the Games. 

There will also be three refugee paddlers in Saman Soltani, Saeid Fazloula and Fernando Dayan Jorge Enriques. 

China’s Shixiao Xu and Mengya Sun are favourites to repeat their Tokyo 2020 success in the women’s canoe double 500m in Paris. 

Nevin Harrison of the United States will be seeking to defend her women’s C1 200m crown but is expected to come under pressure from Cuba’s Yarisleidis Cirilio Duboys. 

“I'd love to repeat what I did in Tokyo (2020),” said Harrison.  

“I'm not putting too much expectation on the next couple of days, but definitely success looks like another gold medal.” 

In the men’s canoe single 1000m, all eyes will be on Brazil’s Isaquis Guimaraes Queiroz as he hopes to defend the title with Romania’s Catalin Chirila and Czechia’s Martin Fuksa set to put up a big challenges. 

Sebastian Brendel, the 36-year-old German who is a double Olympic champion in the men’s C1 1000m, will also be pushing for another medal. 

Peter Kretschmer and Tim Hecker, the reigning world champions from Germany, are poised to scrap it out with China’s Hao Liu and Bowen Ji and Spain’s Cayetano Garcia and Pablo Martinez for men’s canoe double 500m gold.  

Germany will be looking to retain the men’s kayak four crown, with the quartet splitting in half to contest the men’s kayak double as well. 

Jacob Schopf will team up with Max Lemke, while Tom Liebscher-Lucz and Max Rendschmidt will combine in the other German boat. 

The men’s kayak single 1000m will see Hungarian duo Balint Kopasz and Adam Varga and Portugal’s Fernando Pimenta battle it out for top spot. 

Kopasz is the reigning Olympic champion with Varga and Pimenta winning silver and bronze respectively in Tokyo.