Who is in the Slovakian Master’s Men’s team? Where do they train? What were the worst and best moments that have ever happened to them? What are their expectations for WRC R6 Indonesia? Here are their answers and more ….
“Who are we?
We are men’s rafting team – RK Fortuna Bratislava. The Club was established in 1999, and we come from Bratislava, Slovakia.
Who are the team members?
In the team are people who grew up around the water. We can start with the white water slalom paddlers such Milan Petrovic, Martin Samsely and Rado Orokocky. Then we can continue to the rowing people – Ondrej Hambalek and Martin Petrik. The team member who paddles kayaks just for fun is Miroslav Kasak. At the home races we have other guys who only do rafting such Andrej Mesaros and Milan Moravsky.
Where is our training base?
We live in Bratislava, the capital city of Slovakia and we train on the artificial course in Cunovo, near the city – the place where the European Championship was last year (2014). Also we are getting our physical endurance on the small river near the house of two team members called Small Danube. It is a flat water river, but for straight paddling it is enough. Besides that, we are so close to the Salza River in Austria or we can go to Czech Republic.
Do we have a coach?
Yes we have 6 coaches in the boat. Seriously. We have two major coaches – Milan Petrovic and Rado Orokocky. They also train the women’s raft team called Mistral. Everybody knows these ladies. They are the best in the world with many World and European titles.
The worst thing that has happened in the rafting?
I think that at this time we haven’t had such a bad situation (knock, knock). Yes, we flipped a few times but nothing serious. Maybe once at European championship in Russia we flipped and we were shocked, because the water was 5 degrees – cold!
The best moment in rafting?
It could be every successful race, when we get a good run. But it is not only about races. It is also about the atmosphere during training and of course races. If there is a good feeling in the team then it is often also very funny off river too and this is the important thing. We are doing this sport also for the fun.
What is our aim at the World Championship 2015 in Indonesia?
Take the medals. Seriously. At the local races in Slovakia we are in contact with the best Slovak rafting teams in the Open category so we predict that in the Masters we can take the medals. Some members from the team got medals at last years European Championship in each discipline. So we will be disappointed if we go back to Slovakia without medals. If we will take more than one or even gold it will be absolutely great. We want to sing our national anthem.
Sponsors:
Bazen Plus – www.bazenplus.sk – a company which is involved with everything when building swimming pools and whirl pools in the garden (not big one for swimming championship :-))
Raveco – www.raveco.sk – a company which builds houses and the services for it.
Nepa – www.nepa.sk – this company is focused on air-condition systems and LED electricity systems.
Good luck and see you in Indonesia.”
Thank you Radoslav for sending us this.
I’ve met this team and so I can say that the WRC R6 2015 Masters category will definitely be one of the toughest. The desire to compete and prove themselves even in this category has not left these competitors.
“No retreat, no surrender” is definitely the motto of the Master’s categories this year. And this attitude makes me happy, because it suggests a great battle on the river, and we all love to watch that.
