Ferg: We're better off without hothead Fouhy

Photo: Brendon O'Hagan

'PAIN IN THE BUTT': Kayaking legend Ian Ferguson is looking forward to coaching a national team minus the temperamental Ben Fouhy.

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Kayaking legend Ian Ferguson is looking forward to coaching a national team minus the temperamental Ben Fouhy.

And Ferguson's also looking forward to joining forces with his triple Olympic gold medal-winning partner Paul MacDonald, who has come on board as the coach of the women's team.

Fouhy ruled himself out of the team that will contest the world championship by failing to turn up at the national trials last week.

He cited personal reasons and has laid low since; making no comment. He had only just recommitted to paddling after taking a year out following the Beijing Olympics and won the national championship two weeks ago.

However, witnesses reported Fouhy was physically distressed after winning the K1 1000m title ahead of Steve Ferguson.

Ian Ferguson has coached Fouhy on a personal level as well as overseeing his performances at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, when Fouhy finished fourth in the K1 1000m.

The pair have always had a fractious relationship and Ferguson told the Sunday Star-Times he was looking forward to going away without Fouhy.

"Last year we had a fantastic trip [to the world championships] and now we're going to have another fantastic trip. I think we've got a team capable of winning medals."

Ferguson said he was disappointed Fouhy had decided to miss the national trials but was not upset to be coaching a team without him, saying Fouhy was so intense and competitive he could be a "pain in the butt".

"He's a great athlete but a very complex character. He's so intense he gets confused in his mind about how he wants to do it. He hates to lose and he's so competitive that sometimes that's been his undoing – it's just the way he is."

In welcoming MacDonald on board as his assistant, Ferguson referred to a brief period when MacDonald was coaching Fouhy ahead of Beijing, a relationship which broke down when Fouhy "threw one of his tantys [tantrums]".

While hoping Fouhy would return to the sport one day, Ferguson also added: "But we've got a fantastic world championship team and we're not dependent on Ben for results as we have been in the past. We can do OK without him."

Fouhy sprang to prominence when, under Ferguson's guidance, he won the 2003 world title and then finished second at the Athens Olympics, New Zealand's first kayak medal at the Olympics since the golden Ferguson-MacDonald era of the 1980s.

Ferguson said getting MacDonald on board as the women's coach was a coup.

"I've been on his case to do this for a while and I've been on Canoe Racing New Zealand's case as well, saying he's the guy we want.

"He's the best person in the world to get into that job; he's got all the class and experience that we want."

Ferguson and MacDonald won gold medals together in the K2 500m and K4 1000m at Los Angeles in 1984 and in the K2 500m at Seoul in 1988.

National team:

Men: Steve Ferguson, Troy Burbidge (K2 1000m), Scott Bicknell (K1 200m), Mike Walker, Liam O'Lough-lin, Fred Teear, Darryl Fitzgerald (K4 1000).

Women: Erin Taylor (K1 500m, K4 500m), Teneale Hatton, Lisa Carrington (K2 500m, K4 500), Jaimee Lovett (K4 500m).

- © Fairfax NZ News