The "Good Luck Beijing" 2007 Canoe/Kayak Slalom Open began at Beijng's Shunyi Olympic Rowing-Canoeing Park on August 16. After the two-run heats in both the men's C-1 and K-1 event, a total of 12 canoeists and 15 kayakists, among whom many rank high in the world , made into the semifinals scheduled for tomorrow.

The slasom open featuring four events, namely men's C-1 and C-2, men's K-1 and women's K-1, will be contested in a course 280 meters long with 20 gates.

In the men's C-1 heats, Michal Martikan of Slovakia, who currently ranks first in the world, made no errors in going through the gates on both runs. On his first run, he was beat to the second place by a narrow margin of 0.01sec. By clocking 91.76secs on the second run, the fastest for a single run, he came out on top with a two-run total of 188.61 to advance to the semifinals. Nico Bettge of Germany, No. 2 in the world who finished third on both runs, had to be content with a second place in the heats with a total time of 192.72, or 4.11secs slower that that of the first-place finisher. David Florence of Great Britain, ranking fourth in the world, finished third with 193.80. The fourth place in the heats went to Tony Estanguet of France, gold medalist at both the Sydney and Athens Olympic Games, who had a penalty time of four seconds added to his time achieved for hitting the gates twice on the first run. Most of these top paddlers did well compared with their performances in previous major world tournaments.

However, there are canoeists with much contrary results from the two runs. Jan Benzien of Germany, whose total time ranked fifth after the two-run heats, finished 11th on the first run and 4th in the second; Dejan Stevanovic of Slovenia, 7th in the heats, finished 14th and 6th respectively. The most incredible results came from Benn Fraker of the United States, who finished 1st on his first run but 18th on the second, his final ranking in the heats being the 10th which almost shut him out of the semifinals. China's Teng Zhiqiang, who finished 9th and 8th respectively on two runs, eventually earned him a sixth place in the heats. Teng, ranking 92nd in the world, is the lowest ranked among all the canoeists for the next round of competition who are all above 32nd in the current world rankings. The other two Chinese paddlers, Zhang Yalei and Feng Liming, failed to enter tomorrow's semifinals.

The other four paddlers who got into the semifinals are: Tomas Indruch and Stanislav Jezek of Czech Republic, James Cartwright of Canada and Jost Zakrajsek of Slovenia.

In the men's K-1 heats, Erik Pfannmoller of Germany, ranking second in the world this year, made no errors on the first run with a time of 89.71. Although ranking 6th on the second run, he managed to pass all the gates smoothly and finally finished first after the heats. Julien Billaut of France, runner-up in last year's World Championships, had two seconds added for hitting Gate 7, which finally placed him second in the heats. Brett Heyl of the United States, by clocking the fastest time of 89.49 with no errors on his second run, finished third after the two-run heats.

Obviously, there were more paddlers with no errors in the men's K-1 heats, most of whom were among the top 15 and qualified for tomorrow's semifinals. Other paddlers who made the semifinals were: Scott Parsons of the United States, Ivan Pisvajc and Vavrinec Hradilek of Czech Republic, Campbell Walsh of Great Britain, Fabian Dorfler of Germany, Jan Sajbidor and Peter Cibak of Slovakia, Mathias Rothenmund of Switzerland, 40-year-old David Ford and John Hastings of Canada, Anthony Brown of Australia and Pierre Bourliaud of France. All the three Chinese paddlers, Xian Jinbin, Ding Fuxue and Huang Cunguang, failed to enter the semifinals.

There will be two rounds of competition tomorrow afternoon, one for semifinals and the other for finals. A two-run total time will help determine the placings in both the men's C-1 and K-1 events.