Beijing 2008 Olympics

Hungary’s Natasa Janics and Katalin Kovacs repeated their Gold medal winning performance in Kayak Doubles (K2) 500m with Poland’s Beata Mikolajczyk and Aneta Konieczna winning the silver and France’s Marie Delattre and Anne-Laure Viard taking home the Bronze.

(L-R) Aneta Konieczna, Beata Mikolajczyk, Katalin Kovacs, Natasa Janics, Anne-Laure Viard, Marie Delattre (Photo credit: Getty Images)

Germany’s Alexander Grimm won the gold in a thrilling come-from-behind victory in the Men’s Slalom Kayak Single. Fabien Lefevre of France took the silver while Togo’s Benjamin Boukpeti won the bronze.

Germany’s Alexander Grimm wins Gold in Men’s Slalom Kayak Single (Photo credit: Getty Images)

As someone who enjoys ocean kayaking and appreciates the work of the competition side of slalom, the Olympics are one of the rare glimpses the public has of this extraordinary sport. Hopefully for many of those who watched this event, they’ll take the plunge and get involved in Kayaking.