Darryl Fitzgerald and Steven Ferguson finished seventh in the Olympic mens K2 1000 kayak final at Eton Dorney today.
Fitzgerald and Ferguson made a slow start and trailed the field at the halfway point, but came home strongly.
They were timed at 3min 12.177s. The race was won by Hungarians Rudolf Dombi and Roland Kokeny in 3min 09.646, just ahead of the Portuguese pair of Fernando Pimenta and Emanuel Silva.
Ferguson and Fitzgerald are a slightly unusual pairing. Ferguson, a 32-year-old Aucklander, is at his fourth Olympics. Fitzgerald, 21, comes from Gisborne and described his first Olympic experience in London as a huge learning curve.
They are a relatively new combination and after their solid showing at the Olympics, want to continue racing together.
Ferguson said he and Fitzgerald were happy with how they put their race plan into operation in the final. We wanted to finish with a surge over the last 250 metres. Thats when some of the paddlers start dying out there. Unfortunately, we didnt quite have it.
We gave it everything and did as well as we could.
In the mens K1 1000 B final New Zealander Ben Fouhy was sixth in 3min 34.710, nearly five seconds behind race winner Jorge Garcia of Cuba.
