Soon after Bulli Surf Life Saving Club’s Jasmine Locke was named Athlete of the Year at Illawarra SLS Awards of Excellence, the 21-year-sprint kayaker flew to Italy to compete in the U23 Canoe Sprint World Championships, held at Auronzo from July 5-9.

"I ended up 12th in the K1 500, which I was really happy with," Jasmine told us today, as she was travelling home from Europe. 

"I had no idea where I was going to be against the rest of the world, and going into worlds I was happy with a B final (top 18).

"I was happy with the race that I produced, and I feel that it was another step towards improvement. 

"In the K4 we got 10th. We would have liked an A final (top 9), but I believe we performed well together.

"We had a couple of disruptions at our training camp in Italy so we weren’t able to spend as much time in the K4 as we would have liked but we pulled together a couple of good races at worlds."

Jasmine was one of the flag bearers and posted on her Instagram page, saying it had been an honour to captain the Australian team alongside Fletcher Armstrong.

In its event wrap, PaddleNSW reported: "The NSW athletes, who are all part of the NSWIS team, have made us very proud and prove that the future is bright for Sprint Kayaking in NSW.  

"Well done to all the coaches, support staff and families involved in getting these athletes to the World Champs."

Find all the results from the Junior/Under 23’s World Championships at the PaddleNSW website. 

Jasmine is a member of the Illawarra Canoe Club, which has a clubhouse on Lake Illawarra at Warrawong.

The Canoe Club has a talented young competitive division as well as an older group of social paddlers. More information via its Facebook page.

Read more about Jasmine and her legendary local coach, Terry Prosser, here