Kayak Fours (K4), 500 metres, Men

This was the Olympic début for this event, replacing the 1000 metres men’s K-4 that was held from 1964-2016. A battle between Germany and Spain was expected. The German quartet has been unbeaten at the World Championships since 2017, while Spain had been runners-up to them on each occasion. They beat the Germans in the ICF World Cup in Hungary, however, shortly before the Olympics in Tokyo.

Both countries won their heats in the preliminaries and semi-finals to qualify for the A Final. The German four of Tom Liebscher, Max Lemke, Ronald Rauhe, and Max Rendschmidt won the gold medal after a close-fought race, ending just 0.226 seconds ahead of Spain. Slovakia finished third.

As for the German Team, this was the third gold medal for Rendschmidt and a second for Leibscher. They both were members of the German K-4 team that won Olympic gold at Rio in 2016. For Rauhe, it was also his second Olympic gold and his fifth medal overall from five different Olympics going back to Sydney in 2000. He only missed the podium in London 2012. Rauhe is married to Fanny Fischer, an Olympic gold medallist and the niece of the German canoeing legend, Birgit Fischer. This gold medal was the only one for Germany in canoe sprint at the Tokyo Olympics.

Spain’s Saul Craviotto also won his fifth Olympic medal (two golds, two silver, one bronze) and made history by becoming his country’s all-time joint-leading Olympic medallist. Erik Vlček of Slovakia won his fourth medal in K-4 (two silver, two bronze) at his sixth Olympics, having made his début at Sydney in 2000.