The whitewater site and canoeing will celebrate their pearl wedding in 2025. For more than thirty years, major competitions have been held on the Rébech. But the marriage between high level sport and the Fuxéen site was celebrated in 2010, with the world junior championships.
It is a long love story, which has not been denied, for almost thirty years, between the Fuxean whitewater site and canoeing. Among the great witnesses of this beautiful love story, we must invite the memory of Jean Sure, deputy mayor in charge of sports and of the former mayor, Jean-Noël Fondère, visionaries and precursors. To this must be added the enthusiasm of Philippe Calmette, vice-president of the club, or Richard Senssac, former deputy in charge of economic development.
In 2008, Jean-Noël Fondère, Richard Senssac and Eric Thomas (sports director for the city), will make this famous trip to the Czech Republic, to Roudnice, where the world championships in the discipline were held. A click. “When we saw the Czech organization, we said to ourselves: well, that, at home, we can do, and it will be good. Our natural site is magnificent”. remembers Richard Senssac.
2009, dress rehearsals
Then, in 2009, the finals of the French championship will serve as a dress rehearsal before the big meeting in 2010. “In the meantime, there has been a lot of work, remembers Robert Cayla, former sports manager at” La Dépêche Ariège “, which was part of the organizing committee. The stands, the warm-up stadium, were made for the world championship”. The quality of the Fuxean site is making its way into people’s minds. Vincent Holler, then president of the French Canoeing Federation, recognized that this natural site was one of the most beautiful in France, if not the most pleasant in the world.
“This site, Jeannot Surre had initiated it, notes Richard Senssac. But initially, it was not made to have competitions of this scale”. He was fit for the local club, which was functioning well. “As we went along, we realized that it had to be developed”, continues Richard Senssac.
Then come the junior world championships. “An event, summarizes the former elected. A world championship, was it juniors, it was something unprecedented and important for Foix and for Ariège”.
3,000 people per day
“There were a lot of people. A large crowd in the stands,” recalls Robert Cayla. “Around 3,000 people, every day,” to see the races, “adds Philippe Calmette, then president of the Fuxean club.” Bed and breakfasts and campsites taken by storm, in Foix, but not only, “continues Robert Cayla. The competitors were housed in a canvas village, near the tennis courts. One of the highlights was the parade of delegations, on the alleys of Villote, with the flag bearers: “There were athletes. from everywhere, remembers Robert Cayla. South Africans, New Zealanders, Americans, Brazilians, Poles “… But, also, in sporting terms, the double of the Australian Jessica Fox (born in Marseille), when she was not The young sportswoman will be gold medalist at the Youth Olympic Games the same year, then a silver medal at the London Games. “This is where we saw high quality people start.” , recalls Richard Senssac, who sees the 2025 deadline with “enormous pleasure, tinged with nostalgia, since Jean-Noël Fondère and Jeannot Surre are no longer there”; the pleasure “of seeing that the facilities that we have set up , at that time have always been used, and today, we go to the next level, with seniors. “World championships in 2010, it was extraordinary. The extraordinary will be back in 2025 .
–
