Dustin Urban and his kayak are half-buried in the swirling water as he competes in a World Cup of Freestyle Kayaking event in Augsburg, Germany, last month. Urban, who grew up in Sedgwick, won the bronze medal.

BUENA VISTA, Colo. — It’s a long way from the swirling waters of Blue Hill Falls to the specially designed “holes” and waves of Europe’s water courses.

But Dustin Urban, who grew up in Sedgwick and paddled the falls as a youth, has navigated that journey in admirable fashion.

In three separate events in late August, Urban took the bronze medal in the World Cup of Freestyle Kayaking.

Urban placed fifth in the first event at Prague, Czech Republic. He won the second event in Augsburg, Germany. And he placed fifth in the final event in Thun, Switzerland as one of just three competitors to make the top five in all three events.

“I went into it hopeful that I’d do well,” said Urban Tuesday from Buena Vista, Colo., where he and his wife Katie now make their home.

He said that, after doing well in some high-level competitions closer to home this summer, “I knew that I stacked up well against the other American competitors. If you’re doing well in the United States, you’re usually going to do pretty well on the world stage.”

Urban began kayaking at age 12 and has been competing in freestyle kayaking since he was a student at Blue Hill’s Bay School and George Stevens Academy.

Now a 2007 graduate of Princeton University, he still remains deeply involved in the sport he loves.

Freestyle kayaking, at the level practiced by Urban and other world class competitors, puts kayak and kayaker through a series of moves that most paddlers would never contemplate.

The “rides” — Urban made 32 of them during the three-week competition — each last 45 seconds and the competitors are scored by a panel of judges based on the variety and difficulty of the moves executed.

Tricks with names like “McNasty” and “Helix” put kayakers into the air, under the water and upside down almost in the blink of an eye.

With 89 competitors in the men’s division of the World Cup, there were a lot of rounds.

“It was a long three weeks in terms of physical and mental endurance,” said Urban. “To stay in that competitive mode was a bit stressful at times.”

Each kayaker has his own routine.

“I would develop a routine for a given spot,” said Urban. “The list of tricks will be dictated by how I’ve been doing in training, which moves are most consistent. You have to go for the higher scoring moves, which are also the riskier moves, and you only get scored when you’re in the designated feature.”

(The “feature” is the place in the river where the action must occur.)

Especially with the riskier moves, it’s possible to “flush,” said Urban, which means the competitor comes out of the feature and starts heading downstream.

When that happens, he said, “you waste valuable time getting back.”

At the end of the competition, Urban trailed only gold medalist Peter Csonka from Slovakia and silver medalist Nick Troutman of Canada in points.

“I was definitely fortunate to be as consistent as I was,” he said.

Urban has been a member of the U.S. Freestyle Kayak Team for eight years and won the world championship in squirt boating, a niche discipline of freestyle, in Australia in 2005.

This year, he also won the freestyle event at the Teva Mountain Games in Vail, Colo., as well as the Buena Vista Pro Rodeo and finished among the top five in every competition he entered.

His success was celebrated by his friends and neighbors in Buena Vista when he returned home. Friday, Sept. 12, was proclaimed by Mayor Cara Russell as Dustin Urban Day.

Urban, whose degree from Princeton is in politics, says he’s still trying to figure out what his career is going to be.

But for now it’s back to work with South Main, a company started by his wife and brother-in-law that’s building a traditional neighborhood development with all-green construction.

Not surprisingly, that development includes construction of a whitewater park in a stretch of the Arkansas River that flows just 150 feet away from the back porch of the Urbans’ home.