Australia’s Cory Hill won the Molokai Challenge on Sunday afternoon.
Sunday’s race marked the end of the Kanaka Ikaika spring season.
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On Sunday, paddlers began on Molokai and went 32 miles, finishing at Maunalua Bay Beach Park in Hawaii Kai.
Hill won the 47th edition of the race with a time of 3:40:42.39, winning the competition for the second year in a row.
“It feels amazing to come out with a win,” Hill said after the race. “That’s what you strive for back home training, doing the long kilometers. It got a little cold back in the Gold Coast in Australia. You just gotta keep pushing and keep striving. To come out here and have unfavorable winds, currents, just stoked to sort of do what I strive to do.”
The runner-up and highest local finisher on Sunday was Pat Dolan, a Kailua native and Maryknoll almnus who finished with a time of 3:45:04.07. Dolan was aiming to become the first person to win an OC-1 solo Molokai to Oahu race and the surfski solo Molokai to Oahu race. Dolan had won the OC-1 race on May 4 in record time before finishing second to Hill on Sunday.
“This is our race, so I take a lot of pride in coming across (the finish line),” Dolan said. “The goal is always to win but just keep on working on it. Through the history of it, we’ve had some really good Hawaii surfski paddlers. Unfortuneately, none of us have been able to get it. Hopefully, we can motivate some younger guys to get on it. Cole Jones (Sunday’s third place finisher) is out there, he should be getting in soon, he’s our new young hope.
“But I just gotta thank Cory for coming. A lot of Australians last year and this year, he was the only one making it a legit world race. Just thank him for coming out and showing how good he is, the reigning world champ and world class guy as well.”
Meanwhile, Anne Cairns had the top time women’s surfski competition with a 5:46:13.50.