Sage Donnelly has been kayaking since she was very young. Her training and perseverance has paid off and this year she won the Freestyle World Junior Championships in Canada. Here is the update on her recent races and wins.
Wow, 2015 has been an amazing year! I’ve been all over the world starting off in Spain for training for Jr. Slalom World Championships and ending in Canada for Freestyle World Championships. I went to La Seu, Spain with my coach (who is actually from there) in February. It was an incredible course and I was lucky to be able to stay with my coach’s mom and train with the Junior and Senior Spanish National Teams! I finished up my trip with a race and placed second in Under 16 Women’s in both Canoe and Kayak!
I flew home to meet the Alberta, Canada slalom team for a week training camp in California. Once that was finished, I was home for about two weeks, then I went to Brazil for Jr. Slalom World Championships where I placed 12th in Canoe and 29th in Kayak. After I arrived home from there, we packed everything in the van and headed out to Colorado where I was in a BBC documentary with some of my kayaking heroes, then was second in the Homestake Creek Race at the GoPro Mountain Games, and finished with Freestyle Team Trials where I was top boat heading to Freestyle Worlds in Canada!
Right after team trials, we drove straight up to Idaho for the Payette River Games where I was 5th overall in Women’s Stand Up Paddle Board. I also was able to run the whole 15 miles of the class five section of the North Fork of the Payette including Jacobs Ladder! We then drove up to Canada for the Pan American Games where I was sixth overall in Women’s Kayak. Finally, to finish our trip, we drove up to the Ottawa River for Freestyle World Championships where I won the Jr. Women’s division! I’m now back home and have started training for next years competitions, Krakow, Poland, here I come!
Sage first talked to The Girl’s Guide to Swagger early in 2014. You can click here to read her first interview. Sage had been hoping to go to the 2016 Summer Olympics, but the US did not qualify to have a women’s boat in the race. Sage is looking forward to the next Olympics in 2020 in Japan.