World Kayak Event Coverage

Thun, Switzerland – Whether or not the Swiss national team puts any members on the podium at the end of this week’s International Canoe Federation Freestyle World Championships, under way now through Sept. 6, they hope to win an even more important campaign.

The eight-member team agrees freestyle kayaking, the newest of competitive paddlesports disciplines, isn’t nearly as high on the Swiss national consciousness as winter sports like skiing and ice hockey or even slalom, an Olympic discipline, But the team hopes to enlist the help of the international family of whitewater paddlers they are hosting here this week and associated media interest in the event, to raise Swiss awareness of an issue that transcends the sport.

On Wednesday, local organizers of the World Championships are inviting visiting athletes, politicians and journalists to float down the Aare River. The goal is to draw attention to the plight of Swiss rivers and river ecosystems under threat because of a new law that subsidizes further hydropower development in a country that already using 95 percent of its rivers to generate hydropower.

Simon Hirter, director of Verein Wellen Events, producers of the World Championships is also the River Watch Ambassador for the Swiss chapter of WWF. Hirter said the new Swiss law has created an alarming situation since more than 500 new hydropower projects have been proposed in the year since the law was enacted. Hirter said the crisis also marks the first time fishermen are joining forces with kayakers to fight to preserve Swiss rivers from hydropower assault.

Following Wednesday’s float, WWF will host a panel discussion with Barbara Egger-Jenzer, Director of Energy, Infrastructure and Traffic for the Canton of Bern, Tino Reinecke, hydrologist and head of the Waters Commission for the Swiss Canoe Federation and Catherine Martinson, member of WWF’s Switzerland Management Board. The evening ends with the screening of two environmentally oriented kayaking films, “The Last Descent,” and “Oil and Water.”

The Swiss team is unanimous in its support of protecting the last remaining wild stretches of Swiss rivers. The team is comprised of two junior and six senior competitors: Juniors: Leonie Haberling, 16, Zurich; Sam Schwarz, 18, Basel. Seniors: Andrea Marco Zaru, 20 Trin; Florian Diller, 21 Obwalden, Julian Stocker, 22, Zug; Severin Haberling, 24, Zurich; Sandro Spreiter, 24, Trin; and James Weir, 29, Versam.

For more information about this issue, and all the events during this year’s ICF Freestyle World Championships, visit http://www.icf-thun2009.ch