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26.9.2026
France has finished on top of the final medal table at the 2026 Paddle Europe Canoe Slalom Championships in Ivrea, bringing three intense days of racing to a close after 12 European titles were decided across team events, traditional slalom and Kayak Cross.
The French team completed the Championships with 3 gold, 4 silver and 2 bronze medals, for a total of nine.
Czechia surged into second place after a spectacular final evening, finishing with 3 gold, 3 silver and 1 bronze, while host nation Italy also collected nine medals — the joint-highest total of the Championships — with 2 gold, 3 silver and 4 bronze.
Great Britain finished fourth with two titles, while Poland, Slovakia, Germany and Spain also appeared on the final medal table.
France had already established the foundations of its medal-table victory on the opening day, winning both the men’s K1 and men’s C1 team titles and collecting a medal in all four team events.
Yohann Senechault then added the individual men’s C1 crown, giving France its third gold and helping secure first place overall.
France’s final position was built not only on victories, but on remarkable consistency across the programme.
The team finished the opening day with medals in all four team events and continued adding podium finishes through the individual races and Kayak Cross.
Their three gold medals were matched by Czechia, meaning the difference at the top came through the number of silver medals: France collected four compared with Czechia’s three.
The result represents a major change from the 2025 European Championships in Vaires-sur-Marne.
Last year, Czechia dominated the medal ranking with 4 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze, while France finished second with two titles but a remarkable 13 medals overall, including nine silvers.
In Ivrea, France converted more of its opportunities into victories and climbed from second in 2025 to first in 2026.
Czechia, meanwhile, moved from four titles last year to three this season, but once again remained one of the strongest nations across the full programme.
Few teams finished the Championships with more momentum than Czechia.
Jakub Krejci had already given the nation a major victory in men’s K1, adding the European crown to the World title he won earlier in the season.
But the final night transformed Czechia’s position in the medal table.
Tereza Kneblova became European Women’s Kayak Cross champion before Matyas Novak closed the entire Championships with a dominant victory in the men’s H2H final.
Those results lifted Czechia to three gold medals and second place overall.
Kneblova’s weekend was particularly impressive. She combined Kayak Cross gold with bronze in women’s C1, showing her ability across two very different forms of racing.
Italy may have finished third in the medal ranking, but no country won more medals overall than the host nation.
Its final record of nine medals matched France.
The home campaign began with victory in the women’s C1 team event, where Marta Bertoncelli, Elena Borghi and Elena Micozzi defeated France by only 0.34 seconds.
The significance of that victory went beyond the margin. Czechia had won the women’s C1 team title in 2023, 2024 and 2025, but Italy ended that sequence on home water.
Lucia Pistoni then became one of the faces of the Championships, taking silver in women’s K1 and bronze in Kayak Cross Individual.
The men also delivered.
Xabier Ferrazzi won K1 silver, Giovanni De Gennaro took K1 bronze before becoming Kayak Cross Individual European champion, and Elio Maiutto added bronze in C1.
Italy’s two gold medals and nine total podium finishes represented an enormous improvement from 2025, when the nation collected only one bronze medal at the European Championships.
Few athletes showed greater versatility in Ivrea than Klaudia Zwolinska.
The Polish paddler became European K1 champion with a clean 94.69-second run, returning to the European throne after her previous victory in 2024.
She then moved into Kayak Cross.
Silver in the Individual event was followed by bronze in the H2H final under the lights.
Three events. Three medals. One gold, one silver and one bronze.
Poland’s entire final medal tally came through Zwolinska.
Mallory Franklin also delivered one of the strongest individual stories of the Championships.
After missing the K1 final, the British paddler responded only hours later by winning the women’s C1 title in a final decided by just 0.03 seconds over Doriane Delassus.
Her Kayak Cross campaign then ended with silver.
The final itself contained another memorable moment when Franklin lost considerable time after struggling to complete the roll, before recovering through the remainder of the course and fighting her way back into second place.
Great Britain ultimately finished fourth in the medal table with two golds, one silver and two bronze medals.
Jakub Krejci arrived in Ivrea as the reigning World champion.
He left as European champion too.
His 82.41-second winning run in the men’s K1 final put him almost two seconds ahead of Ferrazzi, with De Gennaro completing the podium.
It was one of the clearest statements of the traditional slalom programme and one of the defining performances of Czechia’s Championships.
Krejci later reached the men’s Kayak Cross final, where he finished fourth.
Ivrea repeatedly showed how little separated victory from defeat.
Franklin beat Delassus by 0.03 seconds in women’s C1.
Italy won the women’s C1 team title by 0.34 seconds.
France defeated Czechia by 0.65 seconds in the men’s C1 team event.
Those margins reinforced one of the strongest themes of the Championships: even across very different events, medals were regularly decided by fractions of a second.
The final day added a completely different atmosphere.
Kayak Cross progressed from afternoon time trials into evening elimination racing, culminating in finals under artificial lighting at the Stadio della Canoa.
Kimberley Woods and Giovanni De Gennaro took the Individual titles earlier in the day.
But the H2H format then completely reshuffled the field.
Reigning World champion Alena Marx was eliminated in the opening women’s heats.
Woods, despite winning the Individual title, went out in the quarterfinals.
Joseph Clarke did not even reach the men’s bracket after an error at the final gate of his time trial pushed him outside the top 32.
By the final races, entirely new stories had emerged.
Kneblova won the women’s crown.
Novak dominated the men’s final from the early stages, opening a clear gap and never allowing the chasing group back into contention.
It provided a spectacular conclusion to the Championships.
The comparison with last season shows how much changed in twelve months.
In 2025 at Vaires-sur-Marne, Czechia led with 4 golds and 6 medals, France was second with 2 golds and 13 medals, while Germany finished third after winning two titles. Italy was only tenth with a single bronze.
In 2026, France moved from second to first, while Czechia remained among the leading nations and finished second.
Italy produced perhaps the biggest transformation, jumping from one medal in 2025 to nine in Ivrea and from no European titles to two.
Great Britain increased from four medals in 2025 to five in 2026, while Germany moved from third place with two gold medals last year to a single bronze in Ivrea.
The two editions therefore produced very different patterns.
France’s 2025 campaign was remarkable for volume — 13 medals, including nine silver — while 2026 brought fewer total podiums but more victories and, ultimately, first place in the medal table.
Twelve European titles. Eight nations on the medal table. France on top. Czechia finishing with a spectacular final-night surge.
Italy delivering nine medals in front of its home crowd. Zwolinska collecting medals across K1 and both Kayak Cross formats.
Franklin responding to disappointment with European gold and another Kayak Cross medal.
Krejci completing the World-European double.
And Kayak Cross closing the Championships under the lights with Kneblova and Novak as the final champions.
Ivrea 2026 produced three days of racing defined by tiny margins, major comebacks, home medals and a spectacular night finale — with France leaving Italy as the leading nation of the 2026 Paddle Europe Canoe Slalom Championships.
© 2021 ECA
