The card reads:

«Thank you for all the hard work you are doing to ensure your product and factory complies with London 2012 sustainability standards.

Here’s our sustainability pin badge (only a limited amount produced!) to say our thanks for all your efforts in making London 2012 a truly sustainable Games.»

The Classic concept came from the need to fill the gap between the more stable racing K1s (Vintage) and the fitness boats (Vipers).

The Classic became very popular to former paddlers that still want to have a K1 but can no longer enjoy paddling a racing K1 and don’t wish to paddle a fitness boat, but also to the late starters into the sport that can do a smoother passage from the fitness boats into the racing boats.

The 2012 Classic has as improvements:
- New Quattro look
- “one piece” construction
- Slimmer rim for more comfort in the hip area
- Decrease in volume in the back, decreasing drag and improving performance
- Volume added in the feet area to keep same level of stability and balance of the trim.

The K1 Quattro Classic

Recognising that the Vintage is one of the key models of our range being used by people of all ages and levels, we decided to upgrade its design and shape to join the Quattro family.

Following its facelift the boat not only has a better glide and stability, but also better durability and reduced weights across the entire range of constructions available, thanks to the one piece construction.

Discover the Vintage Quattro

It is great to have an event where the youth and juniors have a chance to go and warm up next to their idols, and even get their medals in front of them.

In the Ladies class , it was a “golden” podium with 3 athletes that will be aiming to be at the podium in London, and that have been collecting medals in the last few years in this event. This time around it was Marta Walczykiewicz POL (2nd in Szeged) that took gold in a close finish with Natasa Janic Douchev in 2nd and Teresa Portela in 3rd.

C1 200 was another good race, Ukraine won again the C1 200, in the first year it was Yuri Cheban this year his team mate Oleksandr Maksymchuk to take gold in front of Alfonso Benavides (3rd in Szeged) and Thomas Simart (2nd in Poznan) with Mathieu Goubel in 4th place, a great final and again an awesome field, with top 5 all coming in the same second.

K1 200 we had 3 finalists from Szeged, 1 Relay World Champion, 1 U23 European Champion, and a 3 times medalist in this event running this final, the result was obviously unexpected, but to have a 0,003 in between the first 2! Mark de Jonge CAN and Maxime Beaumont, left it all out there into the head wind to present us all with a great finish, where Mark “shooted” a bit better to the line to get gold. Ekaitz Saez was right up there with them to claim bronze in a close finish with the European U23 Champion Erik Svensson from Sweden.

Nelo presented gift vouchers to the overall winners (over 2500 Euros), and Bracsa and Jantex also presented paddles to the best overall.

This year winners of the Nelo Winter Challenge was Natasa Janic Douchev HUN, Mathieu Goubel FRA and Maxime Beaumont FRA.

This event also closed the Winter Series that gathers the best paddlers from this race and the International Race of Nord Pas de Calais, the winner was Maxime Beaumont from France that won a NELO boat and the runner ups were Marie Delattre and Thomas Simart that assured an entry to the Summer Challenge.

Full results

Video gallery

Today the races were over 2000 mt on a straight line into a solid headwind.

In the men’s race Fernando Pimenta POR (8th in Szeged K1 1000 mt) won with 7,43 (3,45 for first 1000) in front of Emanuel Silva POR with 7,54 and Ilya Medveded RUS ( 3rd in Szeged K4 1000 mt) in 3rd with 7,58. Special note to the first Junior from NOR that was 10th overall with an impressive 8.06.

“It was a hard grind into the wind, and being the first race of the season is always hard to know where you are, but in the end it was a good one!” said Pimenta.

In the C1 race it was also the winner from last year Romain Beugnet FRA winning by the minimum margin in front of Attila Vajda (Olympic Champion) in 9,12 with Attila only 0,6 sec behind, 3 rd place for another French Mathieu Beugnet in 9,15.

The girls race saw a great field in a close race with the top 7 all within 10 seconds difference, Natasa Douchev Janic HUN (triple Olympic Champion) took the win with 9,17 0,5 sec in front of Teresa Portela POR ( 3rd Belgrad K1 200) with 3rd place for another Portuguese Beatriz Gomes (Marathon World Champion 2009) just 1,5 behind the winner.

“I was not expecting to win, it was not a great feeling out there, but happy i managed to get this win” said Natasa

In this page you can find all the results and details on todays and tomorrow’s races.

Also check some of the available videos.

We are less than a week away from the 2012 NELO Winter Challenge, and on our list of “nominations” include more than 600 participants from 20 different countries. Organizers (that´s us) are certainly sparing no efforts in preparing the arena at Montemor-O-Velho for extreme levels of competition. Why? Because unlike traditional races where a maximum of 2 competitors per country are allowed, we expect as many as 30 participants from each country vying for the honour of being the country´s best, and ultimately the best in their class. After all, it´s not just pride and glory involved, but more than 7000 euros worth of NELO shop vouchers, paddles from Bracsa and Jantex, and the ultimate prize-a brand new NELO boat being presented to the overall winner for the weekend.
For those at home, tune in to our live broadcast from wherever you are in the world here to witness the action for yourself. Also, results will be posted and updated real time on the NELO website so nobody has to worry about being left out on the action.

So gear up, brace up and see you this weekend!

For participants:
Competition Guide (for athletes and managers)
Start List

More info at the Portuguese Canoe Federation official site and owr own dedicated page.

Two major events from the Asian Perspective:

1. NELO Asia
We at NELO recognize Asia as one of the up and coming to look out for in the racing arena, but at the same time as one of the areas with most potential for development to a higher level. It is an area with very specific needs that sometimes deviate from the norm. Therefore, come January 2012, NELO will see the birth of a new wing - NELO Asia, specially formed and dedicated to the affairs of Asia. Everything from replacing the screw in your boat, to the ultimate ambition of helping to bring the level of canoeing in Asia to even greater heights. You will expect to see more of us at regional or major races in Asia, all in hope of doing every little bit we can to support the growth and development of the sport in Asia, as well as the relationship between us and the whole fraternity who have placed their trust in us all this years. For those who have yet to join us on our exciting journey, we are more than happy to show you the way into this new NELO revolution in Asia. All in all, we aim and hope to take NELO by storm, and leave a lasting impact and impression on people all across asia.

So be it whether you are an athlete, a club or an Association, we look forward to working with you so do not hesitate to let us know what we can do for you!

2. London 2012 Olympic Games
This year, there will be a total of 6 countries, 26 boats and 35 athletes from Asia chasing the olympic dream in London. We wish them all the best in their endeavors, and as always will be more than glad to be instrumental in their pursuit. We will be providing them with support in terms of boats for their use while they are racing in Europe, training camps, or any other form of logistic support we may be able to provide.

As you can see, we can hardly wait to kick start the new year of refreshing changes, improvements and of course excitement in 2012.
Once again, good luck and all the best for 2012.

Guadalajara was the host for 2011, Canoeing took place a bit south in a small city called Ciudad Guzman, the course was brand new with all the facilities required for an event at this scale.

Funny enough there were big local crowds cheering for Mexico!

Competition wise the stress was high, and the main focus was Olympic Qualification so probably not a coincidence that only gold meant a spot in the Olympics in mosts events. It would come as a surprise for all non americans the level of competition in this event, and how well some not well known yet athletes perform at this level.

There were 10 Olympic Spots and according to the ICF criteria the spots shall be distributed in this way:

K1 1000 CUBA
K1 200 USA (Bronze behind Ecuador qualified from Worlds and Argentina qualified in K2)
K2 1000 CANADA
K2 200 ARGENTINA (behind Canada already qulaified in k2 1000)

K1 W 500 USA
K1 W 200 CUBA
K2 W 500 CUBA

C1 200 CANADA
C1 1000 MEXICO
C2 1000 BRASIL ( behind Cuba qualified from Worlds)

Cuba did great qualifying 4 athletes being the most successful nation in this Games, as they won also the Men’s K4 1000 for a total of 5 out of 12 golds. (Canada 4 Mexico 1 Ecuador 1 USA 1).

For Nelo was a great week of work seeing the 10 spots being earned by Nelo users, also we took the chance to start planning the Olympic season with many of the present teams, now back to Portugal to do some home work!

Singapore turned out be an awesome location, but the heat and humidity marked the championships for many of the athletes as they could not recover easily from the efforts made in the early stages.

As always the Masters deserve all our respect, those brave paddlers that pay eveything themselves, most of the times much more than they should, compete in inappropriate schedules and still they enjoy it more than anyone else. They were the first competing this week, and gave all the paddlers a lesson on being hard!

The Junior fields struggled with numbers with many teams not bringing big teams, still the level in the front of the field was pretty high, with some of the sprint stars from Brandenburg coming over to claim some medals. For Nelo could not be better by winning all events in the Junior classes, with the Quattro winning the K1 M, K1 W, C2 and K2 W, not bad considering they were only presented 2 months ago!

U23 was a bit like the Juniors good level but not big numbers, great racing with many of these athletes showing they could easily compete in the Open race, what would probably make the Open race even more interesting….

Opens saw some exciting racing and hot racing!

In the singles canoe Attila Vajda gave it a good go and was leading for almost 3 laps but the heat took the best of him, but as a brave paddler he still paddled all the way to the finish in both C1 and C2 race.

In K1 Ladies Renata Csay took off in the first portage never to be followed winning with a comfortable margin on what was her 9th World Title, but than next day she won the K2 as well making it 10!

K1 Race with 4 World Champions, 1 Olympic Medalist, 1 European Champion and many others put these K1 field as one of the best in the past few years, what a race! Hank McGregor (Kayak Center) took the gold in an impressive race that saw Manuel Busto retiring for the first time in 11 years (struggling with the heat), also Ben Brown had an under par race in Singapore, the other World Champion Shaun Rubenstein ended up in the front group sprint taking 4th place, Ben Fouhy paddled very well but struggling in the portages and coming back every single time took the best of him towards the end, as well as to the European Champion Leonel Ramalho that could not push trough the heat in Singapore. 4 Quattros in the top 10, a good start !

K2 Men after watching the K1 Men it was visible all the k2’s were not going to take any risks and save as much energy as they could, and not endanger their racing so it was all about tactics, and the reigning World Champions executed it to perfection pushing hard only in the last portage taking away from the field and winning isolated. Nelo took all 3 medals in this event.

It is hard for us to describe the feeling at the end of these Championships, as we normally like to see the good side of the events, it is hard to go away from bad scheduling, poor athletes area, no boats racks, no livestream until the last day and motor boats interfering with the results, to mention only the more visible ones, for sure something that the responsible persons should analyze and improve for the future.

Go here for full results: http://www.canoemarathon2011.org//index.php?p=section&sub=article&articlegrppk=87

Now on our way to Mexico for the Pan Am Games and Olympic Continental Qualifier.

All Africa Games took place in Mozambique, at the same time took also place the first of the 5 Continental Qualifiers for London 2012

Nelo donated 20 boats, and got them all the way down to Mozambique, in an always complex logisitcal operation, but after reading the reports from athletes and officials, it’s all worthy!

All Africa Games results can be found here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canoeing_at_the_2011_All-Africa_Games

As for the Continental Qualifier we are also proud to say that all the 7 berths in dispute were won in Nelo boats and by Nelo fans !

K1 1000 Tunisia
K1 200   South Africa
C1 1000 Tunisia
C1 200   South Africa
K1 W 200 South Africa
K1 W 500 Tunisia
C2 1000 Angola

Tunisia and South Africa proved they are the strongest nations in the Continent, with a special note to Tunisia that reached the A final in the K1 500 in Szeged already. Also great pleasure for us to see Manuel Ramos ( Nelo ) country of birth Angola again in the Olympics.

Well done to all!