Subscribe to RSS
Archive for the ‘Press Releases’ Category:
Looi Wins Bronze in Unicycle Marathon
Wellington’s Ken Looi won New Zealand’s third medal in the Unicycle World Championships marathon held in Wellington. On the very tough multi-lap course on the Miramar peninsula Looi took an early lead but had to bow to the superior strength of American Corbin Dunn and France’s Martin Charrier in to the wind.
Thirty knot winds buffeted the unicyclists for much of the course and maintaining balance on the unicycle proved to be too much on some of the more exposed sections. Already billed as the most gruelling unicycle marathon ever, the course included climbing up to Mt Crawford prison four times followed by a steep descent in to Karaka Bay.
Looi was satisfied with his effort and delighted with the result.
“I put everything in to the race and could not have goner any faster” Looi said. “Corbin and Martin were just too strong heading back in to the wind”. Looi was the 2006 world champion and responsible for bringing the event to Wellington.
Corbin broke away from Charrier on the fourth lap to win in 2 hours 5 minutes 39 seconds. This is well off the usual times that are normally well under two hours.
The Unicycle World Championships concluded with an awards ceremony in the TSB Arena and the next world championships will be held in Italy in 2012.
World Championship Co-ordinator, Lynne Klap, said that the ten day Unicon XV was a special event to have organised and that the response from the public has been extremely positive.
“We have had big crowds come to most of the events and the public are always amazed at the skill levels on display and the range of ages competing. I have really enjoyed the mixture of pure sport with the artistry of the freestyle events and the daring of the street and trials unicyclists.”
Unicycle World Championships Marathon Results
Expert Men
1.Corbin Dunn (USA) 2hr 5min 39sec, 2. Martin Charrier (France) 2hr 8min 35sec, 3. Ken Looi (New Zealand) 2hr 10min 41sec
Expert Women
1. Signe Jensen (Denmark) 2hr 30min 27sec, 2. Sheila Rasmussen (Denmark) 2hr 38min 12sec, Mirjam Lips (Switzerland) 2hr 47min 58sec
Kiwi Wins Gold at Unicycle World Championships
Kaikohe’s Christian Huriwai pulled off one of the biggest surprises of the Unicycle World Championships by winning the men’s final in the Street competition. New Zealand has never before won a medal in Street let alone a gold medal. Just as surprising was the failure of defending champion, Frenchman Adrien Delecroix, to make the top three.
Huriwai scored well across each of the three sections while Delecroix spent a considerable amount of his available time trying to perfect a front flip off one of the ramps. This cost him valuable points as he never successfully landed a flip.
Unicycle street freestyle is very similar to skateboarding with tricks such as style grinds, drops and flips are attempted but on one wheel instead of four. Street freestylers put the ‘extreme’ into unicycling as they perform tricks on urban obstacles such as ledges, handrails and stairs with technical proficiency, style and creativity.
The venue for the World Championships was Waitangi Park on Wellington’s waterfront.
New Zealand’s only previous Unicycle World Champion is Ken Looi who won gold in the marathon in 2006.
Unicycle World Championships Street Results
Expert Men
1. Christian Huriwai (New Zealand), 2. Loic Baud (France), 3. Maxwell Schulze (United States)
Expert Women
1. Sophia Pellman (Germany), 2. Irene Genelin (United States)
Unicycle Hockey Final Today
The final game of the unicycle hockey tournament at Unicon XV will take place on Tuesday 5 January at 1pm at TSB Arena, Wellington.
The final teams are: Swiss Team and Deserteure, representing Switzerland and Germany respectively.
Swiss Team earned their place in the final by coming top of their group in the round-robin stage (Group Stage), and then beating Team Great Britain in their quarter-final, and contenders RSD United, from Germany, in the semi-final.
Deserteure also topped their group, and preceded to the final via comfortable quarter- and semi-final wins over surprise Group Stage qualifiers Frederiksberg Unicykel Klub of Denmark and Blau Weiss Bavaria of Germany.
Swiss Team took third place at the previous Unicon, two years ago at Frederiksberg in Denmark, and was world champion on the previous two occasions. Deserteure have achieved second- and third-placed finishes over the last three championships.
Top scorer for Deserteure, Sonja Theiss, had to leave the rink in the semi-final, after suffering a bloodied face in a collision with an opposition player but she is expected to be fit for the final.
Twenty-three teams competed in the tournament, from New Zealand, Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, France, Denmark, Korea, Singapore and Hong Kong.
Germany had the strongest contingent, with seven teams, drawn mostly from the formidable German Unicycle Hockey League, where more than 50 teams compete weekly in this little-known sport.
Teams
Deserteure
Christoph Verholt, Gaby Scherer, Holger Summer (capt), Maximiliane Jaik, Rolf Sander, Sonja Theiß, Linda Theiß,
Swiss Team
Alexandros Coutsikos, Janis Coutsikos (capt), Helen Iten, Ives Metry, Pascal Metry, Martin Schmid,
American wins gold in 10km criterium
Seventeen year old American Scott Wilton upstaged his older rivals by winning the Unicycle 10km World Championships on Wellington’s waterfront. In one of the tightest finishes in the 30 year history of the championships three Americans and one Germany swung around the final corner for the 20m sprint to the finish line under the sails on Queens wharf.
From the outset a fast pace was set on the very tight, 3 lap course with Wilton joined by fellow Americans Corbin Dunn and Beau Hoover, German Jan Longemann, Sam Wakeling from the UK, and the New Zealand duo of Ken Looi and Tony Melton. Drama followed on the narrow bridge by Te Papa when a rider went down and took out the New Zealand trio. The crash resulted in one of the riders ending up hanging precariously over the edge of the bridge. He was able to get back on to the course.
The crash effectively ended the New Zealand challenge early as it allowed the Wilton group of four to jump clear. Unfortunately for Looi and Wakeling the chase back up to the four leaders proved to be too much and they had to settle for the minor placings. Looi pipped Wakeling and David Cox from Canada in another sprint finish.
Wilton’s win was a triumph for the purists as he was the only one of the leading riders to not be riding a geared unicycle. Most of the leading unicyclists now ride a two-geared unicycle but on the tight course this did not prove to be an advantage.
The women’s 10km was a more open affair with Denmark’s Signe Jensen a clear minute in front of Switzerland’s Mirjam Lips and fellow Dane Sheila Rasmussen.
An estimated crowd of 2,000 lined the waterfront for the racing in warm and calm conditions.
Unicycle World Championships 10km Results
Men
1. Scott Wilton (USA) 22min 11sec, 2. Corbin Dunn (USA) 22min 12sec, 3. Beau Hoover (USA) 22min 13sec, 4. Jan Longemann (Germany) 22min 14sec, 5. Ken Looi (New Zealand) 22min 41sec
Women
1. Signe Jensen (Denmark) 23min 40sec, 2. Mirjam Lips (Swtzerland) 24min 40sec, 3. Sheila Rasmussen (Denamrk. Also, 8. Kirsten Henderson (New Zealand) 28min 12sec.
France Picks Up Gold Freestyle Medal at Unicycle World Championships
France won its first gold medal of the Unicycle World Championships when Pierre-Yves Billette was a popular winner of the individual freestyle competition. Billette’s routine combined a high level of technical skill with a very fluid and crowd engaging performance. Despite a couple of small mistakes on very technical manoeuvres, Billettte was able to score enough points to beat a flawless performance by Japan’s Ryohei Matsuka.
Matsuka moved smoothly between the different elements within his programme but could not match the technical variety of Billette. He was though delighted to have imporoved upon his fourth placing in the pairs on Wednesday night.
Swiss David Maillard backed up his gold in the pairs with a bronze medal performance. Based upon Michael Jackson’s ‘Beat it’, Maillard’s routine combined a high level of acrobatic manoeuvres and unicycling skill with a well choreographed routine. Unfortunately a few uncharacteristic errors marred his performance.
In a format that is very similar to ice skating, the unicyclists are given four minutes for their routines and they are judged on a combination of fluidity of movement, the variety of movements, level of difficulty and audience interaction.
For those new to unicycling it was very easy to forget that the competitors were cycling on a single wheel as their movements seemed to be as smooth as those of an ice skater. The most pleasing for the competitors’ was the excellent support given by the Wellington public.
“Who would have believed that we could pack out a TSB Arena for a unicycling event” said Event Co-ordinator Lynne Klap. “It gives me incredible pleasure to see the surprised look on the faces in the audience when they witness the beauty and sheer skill of these athletes. We are unlikely to ever see the best ice skaters in a competition in Wellington yet here we have the unicycling equivalent. And all for free”
The artistic freestyle unicycling concludes in the TSB Arena with the group freestyle at 7pm on Saturday January 2nd. The programme then moves on to more of the outdoor events including the 10km criterium, the trials and the cross country.
Unicycle World Championships Results
Freestyle Men
1. Pierre-Yves Billette (France), 2. Ryohei Matsuda (Japan), 3. David Maillard (Switzerland).
Freestyle Women
1. Satoni Sakaino (Japan), 2. Rina Tachibana (Japan), 3. Yuka Sakaino (Japan).
Swiss Men Win Artistic Pairs at UnicycleWorld Championships
Crowd favourites David Maillard and Gilles Saudan from Switzerland took out the artistic pairs at the Unicycle World Championships with their rock themed performance. Combining a high level of skill, entertaining theatrics and incredible strength, the Swiss pair entranced the capacity audience at the TSB Arena in Wellington. The pair differentiated their performance form the other nine finalists with their lifting, especially when Maillard held Saudan in a horizontal position above his head while circling the arena.
The second half of the Swiss routine had the crowd calling for more as the Swiss stripped off items of clothing while performing unicycling manoeuvres that were technically extremely difficult. Maillard and Saudan were the reigning champions having also won in Denmark in 2008.
The Swiss were the clearest example of a difference in style between the very fluid balletic style of the Japanese and the European focus on the technical unicycling skills.
In unicycling mixed, women and men pairs compete against each other rather than in separate divisions. In a format that is very similar to ice skating, the pairs are given four minutes for their routines and they are judged on a combination of fluidity of movement, the variety of movements, level of difficulty and audience interaction.
For those new to unicycling it was very easy to forget that the competitors were cycling on a single wheel as their movements seemed to be as smooth as those of an ice skater.
The artistic skating continues in the TSB Arena with the individual expert on Friday January 1st and the group freestyle on Saturday January 2nd. The organisers are expecting to again fill the TSB Arena after the success of the pairs competition.
Results
Artistic Expert Pairs
1. David Maillard and Gilles Saudan (Switzerland) , 2. Kaito Shoji and Yuka Fujimoto (Japan), 3. Satomi and Yuka Sakaino(Japan).
Kaito Shoji and Yuka Fujimoto
Triple gold on track for Japanese Unicyclist at World Championships
Seisuke Kobayashi 800m Final. Photo by roadcycling.co.nz
Multiple world champion Seisuke Kobayashi, from Japan, was the star on the track at the Unicycle World Championships in Wellington today. Seisuke won the 800m, 400m and 100m though he had to work hard to hold on to his 800m title. An unexpectedly bold challenge from young Swiss unicyclist, Philipp Henestrosa, looked like causing an upset after he led the field after the first lap of 400m.
An aggressive start by Henestrosa quickly stretched the field and had Kobayashi, German Niklas Wojtek and Henestrosa in a tight group in front down the back straight. Round the corner at the 200m mark Henestrosa grabbed the lead by two metres and the possibility of a major upset seemed on. However, Kobayashi re-assumed control down the back straight on the second lap as the young Swiss rider’s legs started to tire. The superior strength of Kobayashi enabled him to hang on to win by 2.5 seconds from fast finishing Wojtek. Seventeen year old Henestrosa managed to hold on for fourth.
Kobayashi also won multiple gold on the track at the past two world championships held in Switzerland and Denmark.
In the women’s track events only a silver medal by German Laura Gienapp prevented a clean sweep of all medals by the Japanese. The 100m provided the closest finish of the day with only nine hundredths of a second separating Japanese unicyclists, Mayoko Deguchi and Anna Misawa, with Gienapp in between the two.
Results Women:
800m: 1. Natsume Yamamoto (Japan) 2min13.70sec, 2. Yui Sugahara (Japan) 2:14.23, 3. Minami Watanabe (Japan) 2:14.86; 400m: 1.Saori Yazawa (Japan) 1min 1.19sec, 2. Natsume Yamamoto (Japan) 1:01.90, 3. Minami Watanabe (Japan) 1:02.68; 100m: 1. Mayuko Deguchi (Japan) 14.27sec, 2. Laura Gienapp (Germany) 14.32sec, 3. Anna Misawa (Japan) 14.36sec
Results Men:
800m: 1. Seisuke Kobayashi (Japan) 2min 5.60sec, 2. Niklas Wojtek (Germany) 2:08.15, 3. Masataka Seto (Japan) 2:09.36; 400m: 1. Seisuke Kobayashi (Japan) 56.39sec, 2. Niklas Wojtek (Germany) 58.51sec, 3. Hiroaki Okayama (Japan) 58.75sec; 100m: 1. Seisuke Kobayashi (Japan) 13.09sec, 2. Hiroaki Okayama (Japan) 13.62sec, 3. Niklas Wojtek (Germany) 13.67sec.
World Record Equalled at World Championships
American Max Schulze equalled the world record for the unicycle high jump when he cleared 1m 15cm at the Unicycle World Championships today. In front of an excited crowd that surrounded the high jump arena, Schulze cleared the 1m 15cm record on his first attempt and then had the bar raised to 1m 22cm as that is one cm above the unofficial record that has reputably been cleared out of competition. He missed on all three attempts but then had the bar raised to1m 25cm for the crowd and successfully cleared that though it cannot be considered for the record books.
The 1m 15cm record is shared with Joe Hodges from the UK.