Otago sport’s golden boy has been paddling under the radar for the past couple of months. Finn Butcher tells Hayden Meikle why that was the right approach for the world championships in Australia.
Finn Butcher would not trade in his Olympic gold medal for anything.
But he would dearly love a world title to go with that beautiful piece of golden glory.
A year after his kayak cross heroics in Paris, Butcher will get another chance to scratch an itch when he lines up in the canoe slalom world championships at Penrith Whitewater Stadium, near Sydney, starting on Monday.
And he has a nice story about that.
Butcher was just a lad in Alexandra when he was given a poster promoting the 2005 world championships in Penrith. It went up on his wall, he gazed at it for years for inspiration, and now he is at the same course for the same event 20 years later.
Just, you know, as the Olympic kayak cross champion and with a place in the Otago sporting pantheon for life.
It was with these world championships in mind that Butcher made a big call to skip the final two rounds of the world cup series.
After winning the kayak cross at the third world cup round in the Czech Republic, he and partner Courtney Williams, also an accomplished paddler, stayed on in Prague for some training, had a holiday in Ireland, went into camp in Pau, France, for a month, had a brief trip back to New Zealand, and finally decamped to Penrith for a full month to prepare for the world championships.
"It's always a balance for us, balancing time away versus coming home and training in the winter," Butcher told the Otago Daily Times from Sydney.
"You just get real tired of moving around all the time and living in a suitcase and all that kind of stuff.
"I managed to get a few days down in Central, just chilling, recovering a bit from this training and jetlag ... and then basically went to Australia 10 days after we got back.
"It feels way more like home here than Europe does. It feels way more comfortable and the culture is more similar. The coffee is pretty much like New Zealand, that kind of stuff."
Butcher appreciates a full judgement on the decision to choose training over competition will not be made until after the world championships.
But he knows his body and mind, and he knows what the soul needs as much as the giant levers that power his kayak, and he is happy with his decision.
"I always want to race because that's what we do this for.
"But you end up flying back and forth from Europe a few times and it ends up quite expensive.
"I'm pretty happy. I had some good races in those first world cups — probably enough to kind of figure out where I'm at. And we managed to have a really good training block since those races without too many interruptions."
Butcher might forever be an Olympic gold medallist but he cannot call himself a world champion yet.
He won silver in kayak cross in Bratislava in 2021, and his best effort in slalom was 13th in London two years ago.
Now, of course, he has a target on his back. Not that having the status of Olympic champion will change how the laconic Central Otago man approaches the racing in Penrith.
"I don't know if it's any different. I think when I race, I just want to do my best runs. Every time I line up, I just want to do the best I can and execute the best I can.
"There's probably a little bit more outside noise. Maybe it might kind of pull you out of a little bit of focus. But hearing people talk about the Olympic champion ... I’ve adjusted to that.
"I will just execute what I can, what I've got on the day, and see how we get on. But I definitely want to bring home some hardware, that's for sure, along with a new poster."
The Penrith course was established for the Sydney Olympics in 2000.
As cricketers get used to various pitches, paddlers get comfortable with different slalom courses, and Butcher knows every bobble and wave of the Penrith set-up.
"I've been coming here since I was a kid, basically. Every second year, we have the Oceania champs here, and there's the Australian Open, and it's a good place to come for training camps because there's loads of internationals come during their winter to get a bit of fair-weather training.
"The course is mean. It's one of the classic courses on the circuit. And it's bloody good fun.
"I'm pretty confident and know what the waves are doing and the currents and that sort of thing. Spending a lot of time here ... it just makes you feel confident in the whole area as well.
"I've had decent results here before. And it just feels like I’m almost at home."
Olympic glory was always going to change Butcher’s life.
More people recognise him now. He has new commercial and corporate responsibilities. And, yes, there have been some improvements to the bank account.
"I've met heaps of awesome people, made new friends, had heaps of different opportunities — all that sort of stuff.
"I still get to go paddling every day, which is what I love doing. So I guess in that regard it hasn't changed, but it probably just made it probably more sustainable, put it that way.
"I’m not struggling financially as much as I was to go paddling every day. But in saying that, I would have been happy to keep plugging away and doing what I'm doing.
"Life's changed, but it's also pretty much the same, if that makes any sense."
Butcher’s world championships campaign starts with the kayak cross time trial on Monday.
K1 slalom heats and team racing are on Wednesday, slalom semifinals and finals are on Friday, and the kayak cross head-to-heads are on Saturday.
