Vincent and Jensen each win first round heats, advance to C-1 200m semifinals
Two Canadian medal hopefuls paddled to first place in their heats in the women’s C-1 200m on Thursday in Paris.
Sophia Jensen and Katie Vincent raced to times of 46.8 seconds, and 47.22 seconds, respectively, to qualify directly for the semifinal round, bypassing the quarterfinals later in the day.
Jensen was the first of the Canadians to take to the water. She broke out to grab the lead in her heat within the first 50 metres and held off a late push from Antia Jacome of Spain to win the heat.
Jensen, a rising star in Canadian paddling, is competing in her first Olympic Games. She took home bronze in the C-1 200m event at the Santiago 2023 Pan American Games after finishing sixth at the 2023 ICF World Championships.
“It feels cool,” Jensen said about being in medal contention for the event. “I don’t think about it like that, I just want to execute the best race I possibly can, and if the results come that’d be cool.”
Vincent, meanwhile, is off to the semifinals in both the C-1 200m and the C-2 500m, in which she will race on Friday in the boat with her partner Sloan Mackenzie.
“We had a lot of positive vibes after C-2, so I’m trying to soak that all in,” Vincent said. She had finished eighth in the C-1 200m final at Tokyo 2020 before going on to win bronze in the C-2 500m with then-partner Laurence Vincent Lapointe after several difficult months during which they weren’t even sure they’d be able to compete at the Games.
“I think overall I just improved a lot,” she said. “I think we were in a really tough place as a team, just off of the water we had a lot of stuff going on. So, coming into this Olympics we had a lot more positive vibes and energy.”
The two solo canoeists raced to a double podium at the first ICF World Cup of 2024, with Vincent winning gold and Jensen winning silver.
They are hoping for a repeat of those events in Paris.
The C-1 200m semifinals will take place on Saturday, with the first heat racing at 5:40 a.m. ET, 11:40 a.m. local.
The only other Canadians in action on Thursday were the men’s and women’s K-4 500m crews. The men finished fifth in their semifinal while the women were fourth in theirs, both missing out on the finals.