Three paddlers repeat win in Ruta Maya
When we left La Ruta Maya Belize River Challenge on Thursday, seventy canoes had blasted off from Cayo’s Hawkesworth Bridge heading east. When they finished around midday on Sunday, there were only sixty boats remaining, but the pace was a torrid one. The winning team, sponsored by Koop Sheet Metal of Spanish Lookout, crossed under the Belcan Bridge in a record cumulative time of twenty hours, thirteen minutes and fifty-six seconds, topping the previous record by over an hour and forty-seven minutes. The three man team of Armin Lopez, Alex Lisbey and Leroy Romero, are the same paddlers who won last year in a boat sponsored by Black Rock River Lodge. News 5 spoke to the champs as well as the second and third place crews.
Armin Lopez, 1st place, Koop Sheet Metal
“I knew we were going to win. I knew the race would be very hard to win this year because lots of competitors, lots of people were working out. I saw lots of canoes and teams so I knew it would be hard and difficult this year to win. We started to work out from December and we have three teams working out. And I told those guys definitely we could come in first, second and third, but it didn’t work out. We took first, second and fourth but that’s still alright because this is the first year for those guys and they did well. And I have to say that the good canoe that Koop Sheet Metal built, Elvin Penner, a good canoe. Because if you don’t have a good canoe you still can’t win because you have to be in shape and have a good canoe.”
Jose Sanchez
“You had any strategy with the race?”
Julian Velasquez, 2nd place, One Barrel
“Well, not really. We know today we already had first and second: Koop Sheet Metal, first, One Barrel second, so we just give the next team a little break to make them come in because we know they can’t break our time.”
Teddy Vasquez, 3rd place, Chaa Creek
“Our performance today was very good. We know we were going to do good because we were in deep water. And when we were in the hills the water was pretty shallow and we couldn’t go because the canoe was so broad that it stayed in the shallow water and it won’t run. So we had to pump it, pump it, but we knew when we got into the deep water we were going to do good.”
Following Koop Sheet Metal, One Barrel and Chaa Creek, were the teams from Belize Bank, Cobb’s Arm, Programme for Belize, Janus Foundation, Builders Hardware, Mellow Tiger and Medina’s Furniture. The winning canoes can be purchased from Koop Sheet Metal in Spanish Lookout.
