Kelowna Paddling Centre’s (KPC) bright yellow race jersey’s were easy to spot on Skaha Lake Saturday and just as easy on the podium.
Kelowna’s womens crew posted a time of one hour, 24 minutes on the two-lap, 16-kilometre course, a full eight minutes ahead of the second-place team, Lotus, from Vancouver in the Duel in the Desert. The Kelowna men’s crew posted a time of 1:14 beating a strong Vernon crew as well as the rest of the field from Vancouver, Kamloops and Calgary.
The Penticton crew of Tina Hoeben, Lisa Singleton, Brian MacPhail, Mathew Koster, Jen Forbes and Reece Haberstock won the mixed division with a time of 1:21. Penticton had a record seven crews racing.
Earlier in the day, the Penticton crew of Walker Singleton, Justin Odian, Haberstock, Koster, Jaxon Stel and Liam Mulhall finished first in the move/junior race in at 42:35. A novice crew from Penticton won in 45 minutes.
In what would be the closest finish of the weekend, Sunday’s small boat races saw local paddlers Tyson Bull and Launa Maundrell edge Don Mulhall and Lisa Singleton by a half second after nearly an hour of racing. Flat water conditions saw the top four crews racing within a boat length of each other for the entire 11-km course.
The men’s race was won by Paul Hardy of Lumby in a surf ski. MacPhail, the top local, was third in the men’s open. Don Mulhall finished fourth in the surf ski, while Wayne Still took fourth in the men’s Kupuna, 65-plus age division.