Lauren Austin is no Lauren Jackson. And that's probably a good thing for both of them.

For one thing, Austin doesn't pretend to have much of a pivot move, and those Seattle Storm shorts would hang pretty close to her ankles.

For another, Jackson — or any other gifted, highly publicized professional athlete — would probably last about a second and a half on Austin's field of play.

That would be Green Lake, and other flat waters around the world. A second and a half is about how long mere mortals stay upright the first time they take a seat in a competition flatwater sprint kayak, which Austin has been piloting — at a faster and faster rate — since she was 13.

It's an endeavor not for the faint-of-heart nor afraid-of-the-water.

"I fell in a few times," Austin, 19, said the other day at Green Lake, grinning at the memory. "But once you fall in a few times, you don't worry about it anymore."

Instead, you start to worry about who's in the water with you and how fast they're getting across it. Next thing you know, people like Austin and her more experienced training partner, two-time Olympic canoeist Jordan Malloch, are racing all comers in their respective classes — and winning.

U.S. Flatwater Sprint National Championships

Who: Top flatwater canoe and kayak paddlers from the U.S. and Canada.

Where: Green Lake Park.

When: Today through Saturday, 8 a.m. to approximately 2:30 p.m.

Admission: Free.

Best spectator days: Most competition finals (as opposed to qualifying heats) are tomorrow and Friday.

Best spectator location: The area around the old Aqua Theater on the lake's southwest corner, closest to Woodland Park.

Host: Seattle Canoe and Kayak Club.

Defending national champion club: Lake Lanier, Georgia.

Results: http://www.scn.org/rec/sckc/
usack2005/results.htm

They'll get a rare chance to do so in front of hometown fans starting today, when the U.S. Flatwater Sprint National Championships kick off at Green Lake.

Austin, a talented paddler with five nationals already under her belt as a junior, will race eight times (as a single and in two- and four-woman kayaks) in the event, which begins at 8 a.m. daily through Saturday. For her and Malloch, these are tuneup races for the World Championships later this month in Croatia. And, perhaps, another step toward the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

"That's the goal," says Austin, who grew up a block from Green Lake, graduated from Holy Names Academy and just finished her freshman year at the University of Washington. "Three years might sound like a long time, but it'll go fast. I made the [national] team and that's awesome, but I still have a long ways to go."

A lot of Seattleites probably have seen Austin and Malloch — and other Olympic-level paddlers before them — training to take on the world without even knowing it.

In the summer, they're on Green Lake twice a day, around 8 a.m. and again in the afternoon, cutting a clean line through the water in a craft that, for the average sea-kayaker or rower, would seem insanely narrow and difficult to balance, let alone race in.

"You sit in that boat, and you roll over," says a chuckling Bob Ernst, who happens to be standing along Green Lake this day and, as the University of Washington rowing coach, knows a thing or two about water sports.

Even experienced recreational kayakers get a revelation when they sit for the first time in a sprint boat or, especially, a flatwater canoe no wider than a linebacker's thigh. That's why the sport is best learned early.

"When they're 8 or 10 years old, it's easy to learn balance skills," Ernst points out. "Can you imagine anyone trying to teach you how to ride a bike when you're 25?"

Ernst's children, growing up in a house ruled by rowing, are into paddling sports. His son, Thomas, 13, was just finishing a workout in a flatwater racing kayak this day.

Just like Austin and Malloch, they were drawn into the youth paddle program of the Seattle Canoe and Kayak Club, which has been teaching paddlers aged 11 to 75 at Green Lake since the club's founding in the early 1950s by Dr. Ted Houk Sr.

"I loved it, loved it, loved it," Austin says of her first class. She'd been a promising swimmer, but quickly saw the beauty of paddle sports: Instead of staring at a concrete floor of a pool for hours on end, she looked into the sun, the sky, the clouds, the trees.

Paddling offers another advantage: You face forward, a fact that gave rise to the quip paddlers often make when they're called "rowers" by mistake: "Rowers go backwards."

Not even Ernst can argue with that.

"It's just more of a life-skills deal than rowing," he admits. "You can go paddling in the San Juans, you can go whitewater kayaking. And you're facing the direction you want to go."

The direction Austin wants to go is toward the world's biggest sporting event. When she allows herself to dream big, her mind sees five rings.

All that's standing in the way of an Olympic Games? Another thousand days or so of those multi-hour paddling workouts, weight-training sessions, distance runs and other sweating, and sore muscles. Plus a lot more international experience.

And, perhaps, a move from Seattle to the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, Calif., later this year.

But here's the thing: A little heartfelt public encouragement wouldn't hurt, either.

Even in the Olympic world, paddle sports are one of those decidedly under-the-radar pursuits. Paddlers — unless they have missing limbs or some harrowing life story worthy of an NBC featurette — are never on TV.

They don't get paid, rarely get sponsored, and don't even get most of their "Team USA" workout clothes for free.

There isn't much glory in flatwater paddling. It isn't fair, but it's a fact.

That's why it would be awfully cool to see Seattle, which last hosted this event in 1998, turn out this week to give a hoot, holler and major round of applause to Austin, Malloch, and a lot of other people who do something every day as well as it can be done simply for the love of the sport.

Both of them could be representing America in Beijing three years from now. But this week, they're representing Seattle on Green Lake.

Like almost nothing else in life, this event is free. And a heartfelt showing of hometown support would be priceless.

Ron Judd: 206-464-8280 or at rjudd@seattletimes.com.