Jordan Lovejoy of Annapolis, Maryland, swept the Juniata Regatta this past weekend, taking a Triple Crown across three divisions at the Kayak Adventure Series stop in the Juniata River Valley. The event was hosted by the Juniata River Valley Tourism Bureau and run out of Lewistown, Pennsylvania.
Lovejoy won the KastKing Individual Division, the Toyo Tires Team Division alongside partner Jimmy Entwistle, and the New Primal Next Up Division. He also collected an additional $500 "county bounty," awarded to the top-placing angler lodging in Mifflin County. His winning two-day total measured 94.50 inches.
A river built for smallmouth
The Juniata Regatta is a smallmouth event on one of the most celebrated river systems in the East. The Juniata and its network of branches, creeks, and feeder streams hold long riffles, deep ledges, boulder fields, and grassy flats; mile after mile of kayak-friendly water. The Kayak Adventure Series format runs a five-fish limit across two days, which lets anglers keep fishing aggressively rather than protecting a bag, and rewards anyone willing to gamble on new water.
That two-day structure makes a clean sweep difficult. Winning a single division takes consistency across both sessions; taking three in the same event, plus the county bounty, reflects a weekend an approach with very little wasted water.
The Team Title
Lovejoy's Toyo Tires Team Division win came with Jimmy Entwistle, a college kayak angler competing for the Campbellsville University Tigers who has built his early career around his success in multiple tournament trails. Entwistle put up his result the hard way: no pre-fishing going into the weekend, grinding out 87 inches on the team side. He also finished ninth overall in the individual standings, and between the two divisions took home some cash. The pairing put two efficient river anglers on the same team and produced one of the weekend's standout results against a stacked field.
The Case for the NK300 HD
A two-day river event rewards anglers who can keep moving. Stretches of unproductive water sit between the ledges, riffles, and feeder mouths that actually hold fish, and the time spent crossing them is time not spent casting. Both Lovejoy and Entwistle ran the NK300 HD to solve that problem, and the numbers behind Lovejoy's sweep show what that buys an angler over a weekend. He logged just over 34 miles across the two days, reaching water other competitors had to work harder to get to, and still had the energy to fish it once he arrived.
"This past weekend at the Kayak Adventure Series event on the Juniata River was one to remember. I managed to put together 94.50 inches, earning the Triple Crown by winning all three divisions. I honestly couldn't have done it without my Newport Vessels NK-300. In the super-shallow water, it performed flawlessly, helping me cover just over 34 miles during the two-day tournament."
— Jordan Lovejoy
Shallow, skinny water is where a lot of kayak motors struggle and where fish often sit untouched. Covering 34 miles of it without a hiccup is the kind of reliability that turns a good practice plan into a winning one.
The reason the motor holds up to that is its output and its build. The NK300 HD is the most powerful motor in Newport's kayak lineup; 3 HP (1300W) on a 36V system, 110 pounds of thrust, and a top speed of around 6.5 mph. That power is what lets an angler hold a line against current and push a fully rigged kayak upstream rather than fight it. Entwistle, who came into the weekend with no pre-fishing, leaned on exactly that.
"The NK300 performed even better than I could imagine on the river. It powered me upstream in fast current with ease. It handled extreme rough treatment as I hit rocks, shoals, and other things in the river. It didn't even flinch powering me through."
— Jimmy Entwistle
That durability is engineered in. The NK300 HD is built on Newport's heavy-duty HD platform, made for the wear that comes with hard tournament use: reinforced composite steering and retract components, oversized M12 communication-cable connectors, conformal-coated internal electronics, and a dedicated cable strain-relief system to extend service life. The drive is brushless and direct, and the unit is rated for both freshwater and saltwater.
The other half of an all-day run is made possible by power that lasts. Entwistle and Lovejoy paired their motors with a Newport LoPRO lithium battery and finished the tournament day with charge to spare. In fact, their batteries never dropped below 50 percent. For an angler covering miles of river and fishing every one of them, that margin is the difference between making a late move and calling it early.
The Newport NK300 HD is the flagship of the NK HD Series, the most powerful electric kayak outboard Newport builds, made for anglers who put in long, demanding days on the water. Learn more about the NK300 HD.