Новозеландская гонщица выиграла золото на чемпионате мира по гребле

Jacqueline Kennedy did not know she had won the women’s K1 500m event at the 2026 International Canoe Federation (ICF) Junior and U23 Canoe Sprint World Championships until she saw everyone in her team cheering. Photo / Aaron MacGillivery Gisborne teenager Jacqueline Kennedy made New Zealand canoeing history at the weekend when she won this country’s first gold medal at the world junior championships. She did it in the women’s K1 500m event at the 2026 International Canoe Federation (ICF) Junior and U23 Canoe Sprint World Championships held inHalifax, Canada. The Gisborne Girls’ High School deputy head prefect and member of the Poverty Bay Kayak Club captured the gold medal in a come-from-behind finish. She took the title on the finish line by 0.08s over Italy’s Anastasia Insabella. “I could just see all the other girls in the final out of my vision. “At that point, I was honestly so relieved that it was over.” In a release from the ICF, Kennedy said she was “ecstatic”. “The competition is so insane and coming from New Zealand and racing against these massive countries like Italy, the Czechs and Hungary, it just makes it even more special. “I looked across and saw everyone in my team cheering me on. “I didn’t even know what place I’d come, and then I found out I’d won. “I was just so intensely grateful.” The victory cemented her as the junior women’s K1 500m world champion, breaking a 13-year medal drought for New Zealand at the junior world level. The last medal New Zealand won at the junior world competition was also in Canada, in 2013. Taylor Newman, also from Gisborne and the Poverty Bay Kayak Club, finished third in her semi-final to make the A final of the junior K1 200m final. Her final was on Monday, where she finished ninth overall. Kennedy and Newman were on board the NZ junior K4 boat that finished fourth in their final, New Zealand’s best result in that event at the junior worlds. Poverty Bay Kayak Club head coach Kim Hedley said the club was proud of Kennedy’s achievement and the performance by Taylor Newman. “It’s an amazing feeling to have a world champion in the club and it will hopefully inspire others to climb similar heights.”