Canoe Sprint at the 2012 Summer Olympics

The canoe sprint events at the 2012 London Olympics took place at Dorney Lake, known as Eton Dorney during the Games, a private man-made lake owned by Eton College. The latter was also the venue for the rowing events. The tournament saw several important changes from the 2008 Games, most noticeably the removal from the program of all four 500 metre events for the men (C-1, C-2, K-1, and K-2). They were replaced by three 200 metre events for men (C-1, K-1, and K-2) and one for women (K-1) to attract more spectators with more exciting, faster-paced races. All flatwater events were considered canoe sprint events.

Lanes were reduced from nine to eight, the finals were extended to three days from two to allow for more television coverage, and a “B Final” was introduced to rank the top sixteen athletes.

Germany and Hungary dominated the sprint events, with three gold medals each, but Hungary managed to pick up an additional two silver medals, edging out Germany who earned one silver and two bronze medals. This made these two nations somewhat more dominant than they had been in 2008, when they won two gold medals each.

The women had four multiple medalists: Ukrainian Inna Osypenko-Radomska was runner up in both the K-1 200 and 500, while Hungarians Katalin Kovács and Natasa Douchev-Janics, silver medalists in the K-2 500, won gold in the K-4 500 and bronze in the K-1 200 respectively. Danuta Kozák, also of Hungary, was the K-1 500 champion and a member of the gold medal-winning K-4 500 squad, making her the most successful canoeist of the Games.