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Florent Lecoanet
Florent Lecoanet (7/2/1984) is a French Mario Kart player and by many considered to be the greatest Super Mario Kart player in history. Florent has excelled in various multiplayer SMK events; he won 1 French title (CDF 2007), 1 European title (CDE 2008) and 4 World titles (NLG 2007, CDM 2009), CDM 2010 and CDM 2011).
Furthermore, Florent has been GP 150cc Champion of the World on PAL since March 2006, only overtaken very briefly once by Sébastien Holmière in the summer of 2006. He extended his GP dominance to NTSC in January 2007 and has not really been threatened there since. He has also driven several World Records in Time Trial (for both PAL and NTSC) and is currently ranked 5th in the World in PAL and 6th in NTSC. He has driven World Records in Non-NBT competition as well and in this field he is currently ranked 6th in PAL and 9th in NTSC.
Early life
Florent was born in Rennes, France. He grew up in Montauban-de-Bretagne, a small town near Rennes. It’s there where he started playing SMK around 1994/1995, reaching respectable times of 1’02”00 and 12”30 on Mario Circuit 1 (PAL Non-NBT) back then. The internet era had not taken off by then yet, so these achievements were reached without being aware of competition elsewhere and without watching any strategy videos. After these initial results he did not play SMK again until 2005.
The MKDD connection
The release of Mario Kart: Double Dash!! (MKDD) in 2003 would eventually change everything, but not directly. It was not until 2005, when Aurélien Flèche (one of Florent’s friends) bought a Nintendo Gamecube with MKDD, that Florent became interested in kart again. He played MKDD for 3 months and at some point he started wondering how well his times would hold up against competitors from all over the world. After a quick internet search he found the various Mario Kart websites, but more importantly this search would also lead him to the website of the CDF, a French competition entirely dedicated to his old favourite SMK. This motivated him to go back to the roots and he dusted off his old SNES and plugged in SMK. As he started playing he found out that all his old PR’s were erased (something that is known to happen with cartridges over the years unfortunately), but this initial disappointment was quickly overcome when he rediscovered how much fun playing SMK actually was.
Master of the Long Boost
It was not before long until Florent learned about the art of mushroom generated Long Boosts (LBs) and quickly specialized himself in this technique. This specialization would soon become a fruit bearing one, allowing him to hit his first ever GP WR, taking down Camille Batier’s (a French karter also known as Don Camillo and mostly known for his GP skills) MC1 flap, with an LB aided record of 7”76. Later on he would drive countless more LB involved GP WR’s and also create a couple of video compilations demonstrating the use of LB’s nicely, one of them can be found here.
SMK Championship of France 2005
Florent’s first GP WR came right before the start of the CDF 2005 (which was the first CDF he participated in). Because his name was on the list of participants, many people were wondering who this new kid on the block was: the newcomer who beat one of Don Camillo’s most prolific WR’s. This created a fuzz amongst the karters present and they could soon observe a new star in the making. Outside of Mushroom Cup GP and some Battle Mode practice, Florent was relatively unexperienced playing against other players, but he still performed quite well, ending on an 11th position in the overall ranking of the tournament. He almost caused an upset by beating Harold Christensen in the Battle Mode quarter final. At this point in time Harold was already an accomplished Battle Mode player and well known for his skills in this mode; in other words a clear favourite to win that tournament. In his match against Harold however, Florent was leading 5-3, much to the shock of the karter’s watching. In the end Harold’s experience proved a little too much as he came back to proceed to the semi final with a 7-5 win.
World Wide Kart meet, London 2006
In the summer of 2006, the webmaster of the SMK Time Trial site, Sami Çetin, hosted a world wide kart meet in Croydon, England. Florent attended this event and this was the first time he travelled outside of France to meet fellow karters. He wore a T-shirt specifically designed for this event, a gesture that was greeted with much enthusiasm by the other karters. At this point he had already become a strong force to be reckoned with in SMK, but he still lacked a little experience against the likes of Pierre and Sami, thus losing to them marginally in Match Race by 12-8 scores respectively. He did however pull out a 10-10 tie against the PAL Time Trial Champion at that time, Karel van Duijvenboden.
SMK Championship of France 2006
The CDF 2006 saw Florent step up as a great ambassador of SMK as he literally saved the event that year. The organisation did not succeed in finding a venue for the CDF of 2006 and it looked like it would get cancelled. However, as a last resort, Florent offered the final solution by actually letting the players use his appartment as the venue. As the host, he surpassed the expectations of many by winning both the GP and Match Race tournaments. This was against the odds, as prior to this CDF it was Pierre L’Hoëst who singlehandedly ruled the three previous CDF events with an iron fist. Pierre still managed to win the overall classement of the CDF 2006 version, but it was very close, with Florent finishing just behind in 2nd position. His amazing skill and talent was becoming increasingly more evident and most karters agreed that it would only be a question of time now before he would win some major prizes.
Next Level Gaming (NLG) World Championship, Norway 2007
Florent effectively became the PAL World Champion of Match Race by winning the SMK tournament at the Next Level Gaming Championships (NLG), which was held in Orkanger (Norway), July 2007. He beat his eternal rival Pierre L’Hoëst in a historically thrilling semi final and secured the victory by beating SMK veteran Sami Çetin in the final with a convincing 10-5 win. The Match Race World Championship had karters from far reaches of the World including USA, Australia, Norway, Sweden, Netherlands, France and UK.
He also took part in various other tournaments and delivered an especially fine performance in the Circuit Breakers tournament. He almost made the final round, which featured the 4 best players, but in the end he lost out to Patrick Wessels in the deciding semi final tie-breaker.
SMK Championship of France 2007
Two months later in Paris, Florent signed off on another momentous year with a winning performance at the French Championship. Because of his success in Norway, Florent entered the CDF of 2007 as one of the two clear favourites to win. It was expected that the overall win would either go to Pierre L'Hoëst or him. The rivalry between the two became clear from the very start as they faced eachother in the final of the first event, which was the TT tournament. This final took place on one of his favourite tracks, KB1, but the pressure got to him as he hit some weed and ended in 2nd place with Pierre grabbing the first gold medal of that CDF with a clean race. Florent made his candidacy for the overall win clear early on though. In the Match Race tournament he faced Pierre in the final again, but this time the gold medal went to Florent after a convincing 11-7 in his favour. The Battle Mode tournament saw another Pierre versus Florent final. The level on display was extremely high and to this day Florent claims that the level he reached in this match was the highest he has ever reached as an SMK player. Despite Pierre’s strong resistance and fine form, Florent proved to be an unstoppable force from now on, winning the tournament in style with a 11-4 victory. Florent was comfortably in the lead in the overall rankings now, with his best mode (GP) still ahead. Only a miracle could stop him from winning his first CDF from that point onwards. When Florent reached the final of the GP tournament (Pierre was knocked out at this point), he was already certain of the overall victory. But as a true champion he gave it his best once more to also claim the title in the GP final in a thrilling early morning match against Nicolas Haufmann (also known as El Nico on the boards). Nicolas could not prevent Florent from reaching a landslide 5-1 victory, meaning that Florent succesfully crowned his CDF with another gold medal. Rarely had the CDF seen such a display of dominance from one karter, winning all the multiplayer modes with big scorelines plus reaching the final of the TT event as well.
SMK European Championship 2008
This year the CDF became the Championship of Europe (CDE), with players joining from France, Switzerland, Spain, England, the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and even one from the USA. Because of all those countries being represented, the list of participants was historically high, reaching a total of 39 entrants. With his biggest rival Pierre now being retired from multiplayer SMK, Florent entered the tournament as the big favourite. New rivals emerged though, the American Drew Blumfield would prove to be the surprise package of this edition, both in his behaviour and his extreme karting abilities. Florent’s main focus was on winning the Time Trial event, which he labeled his Roland Garros, seeing it was the only mode where he didn’t win a gold medal yet. Obviously this refers to his idol and look-a-like Roger Federer not being able to win Roland Garros, whereas he has won all other Grand Slams numerous times. Florent would break his own tradition though; he enjoyed a prosperous start, doing very well in the qualifying stages and winning with seconds to spare in the CI1 final versus Karel by making the wall Shortcut 5 out of 5 times.
In Match Race everything was going according to plan as well and he reached the final with relative ease, after a strong semi final performance against UK Champion Sami (9-5). The fact Drew would be his opponent in the final came as a surprise to pretty much everyone, seeing Drew’s only previous PAL experience came from playing it on an emulator, which is sub-optimal compared to practicing on a real SNES. Even more surprisingly he even gave Florent a good run for his money, though Florent did finish the job by winning 11-7 in the end. Battle Mode was the mode everyone was waiting for though, the field had never been this strong, especially with Battle Mode World Champion Drew Blumfield taking part. Florent faced Drew in the semi final in an epic match. He gave it his outmost best, even so much so in fact that he ran out of breath after the match had finished. Drew did win (9-6), but Florent definitely didn’t go down without a fight. Florent and Drew were quite close in the overall rankings at this point, however Florent already practically sealed the victory with his strongest mode GP coming up. Drew got knocked out early, whereas Florent went on to win the final against Matthias Boucher (also known as Gatchan on the boards) in a 5-0 clean sweep. Thus, Florent was the winner of the CDE 2008 edition. Being the trophy hunter that he is, he also won the Master Cup after, defeating Sami comfortably in the final.
SMK World Championship 2009
In 2009, the CDF evolved into its final form, that of a World Championship (CDM, abbreviation for Championnat du Monde, which means World Championship in French). The event was open for and advertised towards the global SMK population and in the end karters from two additional continents participated. North America was represented by Drew Blumfield from the USA once again and this time South America was represented as well by the Champion of Brazil, Guilherme Arantes. Of course, much like in 2008, karters from throughout Europe were present, including karters from the Netherlands, Switzerland, Spain, England, Germany. Of course the vast majority of the participants came from the hosting nation France itself.
As Pierre was still in retirement, Florent was expecting the most fierce competition to come from SMK’s Godfather Sami, who had been training on-line through emulators for months. Sami himself had high expectations of this rivalry as well, judging by a trailer he published in the week prior to the event. It turned out both of them were right, as this year’s tournament essentially was a historically thrilling race between the two, starting right from the beginning and lasting all the way until the very last match. In the Time Trial event Florent and his opponent Sami both reached the final with some strong performances. This year the final was raced on three tracks and a wall crash on the final one, BC2, meant that Florent could not take the gold medal home this time. He was especially focused on Match Race this time around though and much like in previous years he reached the final with relative ease. As expected, he had to face Sami in the final again, in what would become one of the most memorable matches in CDF history. To most onlookers it appeared that Florent was in control of the proceedings, albeit very slightly at most. However, thanks to a somewhat lucky 5 lightning streak (Florent only had 1 to compensate) Sami managed to bring the match all the way to the wire. With both players tied on 10-10, the final race on VL1 had to bring the decision. With both players under immense pressure, it was Florent who missed his vital zoomstart and Sami won the gold medal as a result. This was undoubtedly one of the most emotional moments in the careers of both karters; Florent broke down in tears afterwards. He later came back on what had happened stating that this had been his way to handle this sensitive moment of extreme disappointment; of course his reaction was also driven by the unlikely circumstances that had contributed to the final score.
To still have a shot at winning the overall title, Florent had to rank above Sami in both of the remaining events. After having been eliminated by an unleashed Drew Blumfield in the Battle Mode semi final, Florent cruised to a 9-6 victory against Sami in the bronze medal play-off. This meant that with only GP left, he still had a clean shot at gaining the World title. With GP being his strongest mode, he made short work of all of his opponents and reached the final, suffering only 2 cup losses during the entire tournament. Sami followed a similar path to the final, losing only a single cup and drawing one. For the first time in history the Championship was decided by the very last match; absolutely everything was on the stakes. During the final Florent reached out for his maximum level once more and crushed Sami 5-1, in what could only be described as a devastating tour-de-force. This meant he was crowned the Super Mario Kart World Champion of 2009. He later claimed this to be the most important victory of his career, as he really had to earn it through a hard and lasting battle.
Moreover, Florent was interviewed for a french TV documentary about the SMK World Championship 2009. It is available to watch here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzlfWwCcrYY
SMK World Championship 2010
Florent succesfully defended his title at the second SMK World Championship, the CDM 2010, adding another milestone and achievement to his already illustrous career. Attendance rates to the event were still high, however, when compared to the previous two editions, this year the balance in number of participants shifted even more towards karters from the hosting country France. That said, international karters from the Netherlands, Zwitzerland, Spain, England and the USA, were present to complete the field. The 2010 edition had without a doubt the strongest line-up of participants that the SMK playing world had ever witnessed thus far: in addition to the presence of all the top ranked players of the CDM 2009, triple CDF winner Pierre L'Hoëst and multi-medal winner Matthias Boucher (known as Gatchan on the boards) also returned to the competition for this event. As could be expected after the events that transpired during the previous year (CDM 2009), Florent’s biggest opposition once again came from UK Champion Sami, who announced his ambitions in the days prior to the event by an inspirational trailer, heralding the now famous words: “The Time is Coming”. To underline this, Sami took the #3 spot from Florent in the PAL Time Trial rankings at around the same moment. The intense rivalry between Florent and Sami was really starting to resemble the Roger Federer vs Rafael Nadal tennis rivalry in an increasing number of ways and in reference to this, Sami now called himself 'the Rafael Nadal of SMK', wearing a sleeveless top to match.
Therefore, Florent started the Time Trial one-try competition as a warned man. The top 4 of the PAL Time Trial rankings at the time (Karel, Pierre, Sami and Florent) found themselves facing each other in the semi final. Florent and Karel came out victorious and had to battle for gold, in a repeat of the 2008 Time Trial final. Karel crashed once during his BC1 race, Florent did not, which meant he bagged the first gold medal of the CDM 2010. Sami lost his bronze medal play-off to Pierre in the little final on KB1, giving Florent a nice margin in the lead before Match Race started. In the aftermath of last year’s historical Match Race final, Florent had expressed on various occasions that alongside winning the overall title, regaining the Match Race gold medal would be his main goal during the CDM 2010. However, Florent faced the threath of early elimination in the quarter final against Time Trial World Champion Karel van Duijvenboden. Being one of the outsiders for the gold medal in this mode, Karel proved to be a very tough opponent for Florent; in fact the Dutchman even received two match-points at a score of 6-5. After a thrilling final lap on GV2 with a last ditch mushroom platform-jump effort, Florent subverted the first of those matchpoints miraculously. The decisive match had an even more surprising climax; when it looked like Karel was cruising for the win in the final lap of MC1, faith decided otherwise as Florent received a lightning from his very last item pick-up. After last year’s drama in the big final, lady luck was finally smiling Florent in the face; this escape was of monumental value for him, as a Match Race quarter final exit might have meant losing the overall title, when considering Sami's prowess accross all modes. Instead, Florent progressed to the Match Race final to once again meet with his big rival Sami; a chance for revenge. However, Florent was facing a big defecit early on in the match, not appearing as sharp as usual. When Sami was closing in on match-point, Florent gathered all his strength to mount a huge comeback and provide a close match, but it proved just too late to prevent Sami from winning 11-9.
For the third year running, Florent got eliminated by Drew Blumfield in the semi final of Battle Mode, though he put up a good fight with a 9-6 score. Furthermore, Florent obtained the bronze medal in a battle with Sami that had direct consequences for the overall rankings. This result meant that reaching the GP finals would be sufficient for Florent to propagate his World Champion title. Being the absolute favourite in the GP tournament, this proved to be no problem for him. With the overall result decided, the final against Sami still proved to be one of the biggest fights in the history of the Championships, with both players determined to show the world who was best. Florent started out winning the first cups by utilizing some techniques adopted from Match Race, to give him the extra edge. On the other end of the spectrum in this clash of styles, Sami managed to take the match back to 4-4 with very impressive Time Trial like driving. Eventually, Florent came through as the victor in the final and ninth cup by driving a very solid Flower Cup; for the first time in CDF history a ninth cup was needed to decide the GP final. In his victory speech Florent had some encouraging words for his rival Sami, when he expressed that Sami was too strong a karter to not win a CDM one day, signaling a sentiment perhaps shared by many. Future speculations aside, Florent could now boast about becoming the first back-to-back World Champion of Super Mario Kart.
Belgian Open 2011
In 2011, Florent continued to reach milestones and achievements. He started off the year by winning the ODB (abbreviation of Open de Belgique in French, which means Belgian Open in English). It was the first time he participated in a Belgian Open. The ODB 2011 took place in Liège on the 19th of March 2011. The ODB consists of a one-day tournament covering all the multiplayer modes of Super Mario Kart. Florent enjoyed a mini Grand-Slam performance, as he sweeped up all the modes, despite some strong opposition, in the form of Geoffrey Label, Harold Christensen and Guillaume Leviach, being present as well. As there was no Time Trial tournament and the ODB is not the official Super Mario Kart World Championship, Florent's performance can be referred to as a mini Grand-Slam, which still represents a phenomenal feat.
After a brief group stage with an unorthodox set-up, the equally condensed finals were played. The surprise of the tournament was Florent's confident 5-2 (in a first to 5 format) victory versus Battle Mode vice-World Champion (according to CDM 2010) Geoffrey Label, as Geo was considered the best player of France by some margin in the past two years. In Match Race (6-3 win) and GP (3-1 win) Florent managed to dispose of his main rival Geo as well. The full results can be viewed here: http://smkbelgium.monforum.com/resultats-de-lopen-de-be-image-vp6683496.html#6683496. His very succesful ODB campaign left Florent fuelled with confidence for the upcoming CDM.
SMK World Championship 2011
After his succesful ODB, Florent won the CDM 2011, his third SMK World Championship title in a row and his fifth CDF/CDE/CDM overall win in a row. He also claimed the gold medal in the GP competition for the sixth consecutive time, a record like no other in the history of CDF events and one that is unlikely to be equaled or beaten by anyone other than the French master himself. With 36 participants, the attendance rates of the event picked up a little bit again compared to previous years. Once again the CDM welcomed its doors to a variety of karters from the Netherlands, Zwitzerland, Spain, England, the USA and of course some of the finest talent from the hosting country France. Sadly some of the strongest players, such as Pierre L'Hoëst, Harold Christensen, Julien Holmiere and Geoffrey Label did not participate in all the tournaments or in the case of Pierre, none at all. This time there was a camping element thrown into the mix, with the majority of the participants sleeping in tents surrounding the venue. This was nothing new to Florent, who traditionally sets up his tent to sleep in solitude during Championships.
Florent started off by winning the Time Trial 1-try event with crushing dominance. After being victorious in all the sub-stages (from qualifiers to semi finals), he landed a great 59”58 on MC1 in the final, leaving no chance to his surprise opponent in the final Guillaume Leviach. His strongest rival Sami was already lagging behind in the general rankings due to some disastrous crashes in the GV1 semi final. For the third consecutive year, Florent did not manage to obtain the gold medal in Match Race. After a virtually spotless qualification phase he faced a surprising semi final exit after a match against an unchained Karel van Duijvenboden. This repeat match of the famous quarter final of 2010 was another thriller, which culminated in a very tense double LB finish on MC2, this time with the Dutchman coming out on top. Florent redeemed himself by cruising to a 9-2 win in the bronze medal play-off versus Geoffrey Label, but most observants will agree that Florent did not show his true level in MR this year. Contrarily, Florent enjoyed a very prolific Battle Mode tournament, winning a silver medal despite not having practiced this mode much at all this year. Geoffrey Label surprisingly managed to eliminate the reigning BM World Champion Drew Blumfield in the quarter finals, meaning the main obstacle that prevented Florent from reaching the BM finals in previous years was removed. However, Geoffrey Label managed to narrowly defeat Florent in a climactic final, featuring a dramatic 11-10 scoreline and both players being down to their last balloon on match-point. History had repeated itself as a high finish in the BM tournament, combined with an early quarter final exit of his rival Sami on the hands of a rampant Harold Christensen, meant Florent was cleanly in the lead after BM day, with only the GP tournament left. Florent decided to use the heavy weight characters in all cups for GP this year. After the GP final of 2010, which he drove with the brothers on some cups, he had sensed that he was more vulnerable to body-checks and losing out to full speed potential when exposed to Sami, who equips himself with the big guys everywhere. Florent's character switch was a rewarding one as he strikingly underlined his absolute dominance in GP on the final day of the CDM 2011. After one odd defeat in the group stage, he went on to beat Sami in the early morning final with a convincing 5-2 scoreline, including some near WR level performances on tracks like MC4. Combined with his dominating Belgian Open win, 2011 had once again been a very succesful karting year for Florent.
SMK World Championship 2012
In 2012, the SMK World Championship was used as a stage to celebrate the 20th anniversary of SMK (it was released back in August 1992) and the 10th year of SMK Championnat competition (it has been held every year, without exceptions, since 2002). To accompany the celebrations, the organisation staged an elaborate SMK quiz for everyone present, as well as tournaments played on the side of all game modes of the original NTSC version of the game. All the hype generated by the celebrations was enough to propel the participation rates to a record breaking 51! Like every year, participants came from across Europe, with the majority being from the host nation, France. For the first time the Team USA equipe was expanded to 2, with Drew Blumfield bringing Christophe Charignon. Except for Pierre, all the big names in SMK multiplayer were accounted for. Pierre actually participated in the NTSC Time trial tournament, but left the proceedings after this. Aditionally, Sami's Team UK included female World Champion Leyla Hasso as a surprise guest.
2012 was a monumental year for another reason, as Florent’s SMK World Championship winning streak was finally put to a halt. After a rocky start with an early elimination in the Time Trial tournament, Florent was unable to close the gap towards his all-time SMK rival, UK Champion Sami, who became World Champion for the first time at the event. Although this was a huge disappointment for Florent, there were also personal accompishments worth celebrating, most notably his success in sustaining the GP gold medal streak he started 6 years ago, leading to his 7th consecutive gold medal for that mode.
Unlike his main rival Sami, Florent participated in the warm-up NTSC Time Trial tournament, organized one day prior to the start of the PAL competition. He got eliminated before the final, after bravely attempting several LB's on MC2 and failing one of them. Florent enjoyed a promising start of the PAL Time Trial tournament, delivering one of the finest times ever driven at a Championship 1-try event, with a stunning sub 56" time on CI1. Shortly after desaster struck, as Florent was eliminated in the quarter finals due to two crashes on GV3. With Sami going on to obtain the gold medal, there was immediately a substantial gap to cross for Florent. Luck for Florent was not picking up, as in the MR tournament elimination phase he got the toughest bracket possible, with both Karel and Sami crossing his road to the final. Just like in the two previous years, his match with Karel, this time in the quarter final, went all the way to the wire. In the deciding match on MC4, Florent pulled off a cunning backwards red in the first hairpin, stopping the Dutchman from progressing any further. Florent's was struggling to find form in his semi final clash with Sami and suffered a 9-4 loss against the rampant UK Champion. Florent did claim the bronze medal in the little final of MR, cruising to a 9-1 win versus the the surprise package of the CDM, the young prodigyConor Wood.
Championship Medal Collection
Florent is perhaps most famous for his high level performances during the annually organized CDF/CDE/CDM. The CDF was founded in 2002 by Franck Mazieres; in the beginning it mainly featured French competitors and a few Swiss ones. This changed in 2008, which showed an influx of competitors from outside of France; the CDF would therefore be known as CDE from that year onwards; CDE being an abbreviation of Championnat d’Europe, meaning Championship of Europe in English. In 2009 the final evolution of the event took place and CDE became CDM, being an abbreviation of Championnat du Monde, meaning World Championship in English.
In various CDF/CDE/CDM events since 2005 Florent has gathered 7 gold medals in GP (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011), 2012), 3 gold medals in Match Race (2006, 2007, 2008), 1 gold medal in Battle Mode (2007), 3 gold medals in Time Trial (2008, 2010, 2011) and one Master Cup* (2008). Furthermore he has won 2 silver medals and 2 bronze medals in Match Race (2009, 2010 and 2011, 2012 respectively), 1 silver medal and 2 bronze medals in Battle Mode (2011 and 2009, 2010 respectively) and 2 silver medals and 1 bronze medal in Time Trial (2007, 2009 and 2006 respectively).
- The Master Cup was introduced as a new element at the SMK Championships of 2008 as an experiment and was scheduled after the overall competition was finished. The goal was to see if a more randomly organized tournament system could work for future tournaments, clear favourites were not seeded for example, but it was not an undisputed success and will not return in future tournaments.
Time Trial
Florent joined the SMK Players’ Site on the 7th of August of 2005 with a #85 world rank. Although not a Time Trial expert to begin with, he has made his mark in that competition as well by climbing as high up as #3 in PAL, a position he reached in January 2007 (currently he is ranked 4th on the World rankings). Moreover he won the highly acclaimed Player of the Year (POY) award in 2006 (see Awards page), a victory he secured by driving his first ever Time Trial WR in PAL on 22 December of the same year; a 9”37 WR tie at KB1 flap. One month before that, on the 13th of November, he had already driven his first ever Time Trial WR on NTSC with a 11”52 GV2 flap. He joined the NTSC side of the competition a few months prior to getting his first WR there, in September 2006, entering in a high position at #12 on the ladder. The highest rank he ever reached in NTSC so far was 4th during March 2009 (currently he is ranked 6th on the World rankings). He currently holds 6 WRs in PAL and 6 WRs in NTSC (see World Record charts of PAL and NTSC) and specializes in MC2 longboosting and KB1 and VL1 water/snow sliding. He also participates in SMK Non-NBT competition at the Non-NBT Players’ Site, which is an old school SMK competition that limits the use or abuse of zigzag boosting. He joined the PAL ladder of this site in October 2005 in 31st position. He joined the NTSC part of the rankings 1 year later in October 2006 in 24th position. To further demonstrate his all-round SMK ability he also hit WR’s in this competition, the first one being the VL1 5-lap WR (with a time of 50”88) on November 14, 2007. He currently holds 6 PAL Non-NBT WR’s and is ranked 6th in PAL and 9th in NTSC on the Non-NBT Players’ Site.
Various Time-Trial videos of Florent are displayed on his Youtube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/Neo351#p/c/8A4E6C0B7E1DF8F3 and http://www.youtube.com/user/Neo351#p/c/CEF94A38494264FA).
Grand Prix 150cc milestone
Through the years Florent has extended his GP dominance in all categories of both PAL and NTSC (the various rankings can be checked at the GP 150 cc site. To celebrate the particularly impressive milestone of achieving all 20 Best Lap World Records in the NTSC Open category (NTSC Open World Record page), he published a video showcasing all 20 flap World Records. This video was partially produced by Sébastien Holmière and is considered one of the single most impressive Super Mario Kart videos to date, showing unrivalled item mastery and driving. It can be viewed here: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPKa8S5_YlM).
In a follow-up from his NTSC flap compilation from 2009, Florent and his close friend and rival Geoffrey Label (known as Geo throughout the community) published a video showcasing all 20 Best Lap World Records in the PAL Open category (PAL Open World Record page), in 2011. It features some of the most incredible driving and creative item strategies in GP that the world has witnessed so far. It can be viewed here: (http://youtu.be/rtkxN7it01k).
Professional life
In daily life Florent has completed his studies and is to become an overall teacher at elementary school. He studied 5 years in Angers, 1 year in Le Mans and 1 year in his city of birth, Rennes. One thing is certain, whoever his students are going to be, they don’t stand even the smallest chance of winning when they play against their teacher in SMK, or tennis for that matter…
The Federer comparison
Much to the amusement of a lot of people in his environment (and not in the least place to his own amusement), Florent’s appearance resembles that of Roger Federer (the greatest tennis player in history, a global sports icon) like two drops of water. With both Roger and Florent being dominant forces in their respective competitions and Florent being an avid tennis player himself, his peers soon nicknamed him “the Roger Federer of SMK”. The comparison doesn’t stop with their appearance, love for tennis and dominance in their game though. Like Roger, Florent is a graceful champion loved by supporters and rivals alike and a great ambassador of his sport. For example he hosted the CDFof 2006 in his appartment as a last resort to save the event from cancellation and creates a variety of SMK related promotion videos, such as fast lap compilations, CDF trailers, year summaries and more (you can watch some of his videos here).
Message Board personality
Florent is an enthusiastic poster on the various message boards dedicated to Mario Kart. He is known on these fora as Neo, nicknamed after his favourite movie character Neo from the The Matrix Trilogy. Funnily enough, when he entered a picture of himself in a face recognition program to find out which celebrities his face matched the most, both Roger Federer and Keanu Reaves (actor that plays Neo in the Matrix) popped up in the final results. Florent’s replies on the MB are often mixed in a layer of sexual humour; for example he claims that his dick size is only measurable in earth to moon distance units and one of his MB friends, Guilherme Arantes, is quoted saying that: “Florent is a sex machine.” Moreover his MB signature used to be “When things look bad, I just remember that I've got a real big dick, and things seem much better”.
Other Mario Karts
Besides SMK, Florent is also ranked in Mario Kart Double Dash!! (MKDD) and Mario Kart Super Circuit (MKSC) and is therefore also ranked on the Combined Kart Ranks. He is currently ranked #28 on the Combined Kart Ranks, just outside the top 300 on MKDD and 21st at MKSC. The highest position he ever reached in MKSC was 10th. He also tried playing Mario Kart 64 (MK64), but found it a horrifying experience, therefore he never obtained a full set of times there.
Other Games
Florent is a not a typical gamer and does not play a wide variety of games. Apart from the various Mario Kart games he loves playing Circuit Breakers and recently Pro Evolution Soccer, but more for fun than to really excell in them. He is however one of the best in the world at another classic Nintendo game, Super Mario Bros, being within seconds of the speedrun WR and holding the French Record.
Future
Florent Lecoanet has proven to be the most dominant force in SMK over the past years and is without a doubt the most succesful SMK player in history. However, in 2012 his all-time rival Sami Çetin has managed to break Florent's SMK World Championship winning streak. Fans worldwide are awaiting to see if Florent can resume his reign again in the years that lie ahead of us, or if Sami's CDM 2012 victory heralded the start of a new era in SMK's global competition.
External Links
| The 2012 Karter Contest | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Round 1 Groups | Round 2+ Bracket | Matchups & Results
(BOLD indicates contest winner) | ||||
|
(1) Enchanted Woods Creatures |
Finn | Duff | Eoj | Aron |
Honko | Shock | Frigz | NikeXTC |
more like Group J (9) | |
