Loredan Popa

Who is Loredan Popa?

Loredan Popa, born 1980 in Hunedoara, is a Romanian flatwater canoer and current World and European champion in the Canadian canoe C-4 500m event.

His first international title came in 2000 when he was a member of the Romania crew which won the C-4 1000m gold medal at the European under-23 championship in Boulogne, France. Two years later in Zagreb, Croatia he doubled up, winning gold medals in both the C-4 500m and 1000m. In the C-2 final in Zagreb he partnered his brother Constantin and took the bronze medal.

He then moved from his hometown club of Constructorul Hunedoara to Romania's premier club Dinamo Bucharest.

Romania has great strength in depth in the Canadian canoe events and Popa had to wait until 2005 to be selected to represent his country at a major senior championship. In Poznań, Poland, he became European champion at the first attempt as a member of the C-4 500m crew, along with Florin Popescu, Silviu Simioncencu and Iosif Chirilă. He also competed in the C-4 1000m race, winning a bronze medal.

A month later, in August 2005, the same crew went on to win the World Championship C-4 500m title. Popa was the only man to be selected to race over all three C-4 distances. In the 1000m event he came close to winning another gold medal but in a tight finish Romania were just edged out by Poland and he had to settle for a silver medal. In the 200m he again reached the final, finishing sixth.