Early Saturday morning, 1,300 boats – almost 3,000 paddlers from 30 countries — set off on the 100-kilometer course.

Although the course record remained unbroken this time, two teams completed the distance in under eight hours.

The marathon was won by the Czechs Horák and Dasek, who finished with a time of 7:51:24, falling 27 minutes short of the course record.

Organizers said the record might have been broken if the water level had been higher.

Second place went to last year's winners, the French team of Pieter Paauw and François Boucher (8:10:07), and third place was taken by Swedish solo kayaker Martin Nordstrand (8:21:23).

The best result by Estonians was in the women's double kayak category. Linda Tetsmann and Anette Baum finished fourth overall, missing the podium by just 35 seconds.

Estonian Oleg Mozessov finished fifth in a single kayak, with a time of 8:27:16.

The fastest time of this year's marathon was clocked outside the official competition by a triple kayak, Lithuanians Arūnas Dubauskas, Deividas Šatikas, and Vaidas Linkevičius finished with a time of 7:44:52. This would have been the best result of the day had their boat class been part of the official rankings.

The race cutoff time is 24 hours, so the last finishers are expected to arrive at the finish line around 6–7 a.m. on Sunday. All results can be seen HERE.

The 100-km-long downriver marathon runs on the Võhandu River in Võru and Põlva counties.

Every year, on the third weekend of April, the world's largest paddle marathon, the Võhandu Marathon, takes place on the river, with 1,200 boats and more than 2,500 participants.

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