ggercanoeing
A beautiful
partnership
Words: Steve Carter
If you take a look at the ocean sports
scene across the pond it is easy to see
how many great SUP athletes were
once, and still are great outrigger canoe
paddlers. Dany Ching, Travis Grant,
Dave Kalama and so on, the list is huge.
In the UK however, it has been SUP that kicked off
the single blade ocean adventure for most of us,
with many pioneering SUPers taking up and
equally enjoying outrigger canoe paddling and
racing having first found a love of SUP.
Outrigger canoes have been around thousands of
years and are deeply rooted in the history of
Polynesian culture and whilst the current day
outrigger canoes have the advantage of modern
lightweight and strong materials the principal
remains unchanged.
Steve West
In the early stages of SUP race development in the UK, Starboard assembled the first UK race
team and amongst the team was Steve West, who has dedicated his life to outrigger canoe
paddling and later SUP. It should be noted that Steve is one of the world’s leading authorities
on outrigger canoe paddling as an author and competitor. It did not take long for his
enthusiasm and coaching for both sports to rub off on SUP racers. Who once tried OC paddling
were instantly hooked on the glide and speed of the OC particularly in open ocean conditions.
Anne Bellany
At a similar time Anne Bellany from Guildford travelled to New Zealand and fell in love with
the sport of outrigger canoe paddling, along with her partner John Galilee who was into
sailing outriggers. They decided to import canoes into the UK. This gave access to one man
outrigger canoes (OC1s) and two man (OC2s) types to many SUP paddlers as they partnered
with Steve West to share the stoke and knowledge of paddling.
Whilst the sport of outrigger canoe paddling is relatively young in the UK the first club was
formed in 1987. Predominantly two London based clubs, The Royal Outrigger Canoe Club
and Outrigger Canoe UK, were the pioneering clubs. These clubs have many experienced
and skilled paddlers and attend outrigger races across the globe. The clubs mainly centre
around paddling six man canoes (OC6) although many train on OC1s and OC2s. Most of the
paddlers from these clubs have discovered outrigger canoeing from either participating in
dragon boat racing or from more traditional canoeing. It’s fair to say that few of these club
paddlers found the sport through SUP. What is great with outrigger canoe paddling in the UK
is there are as many women paddling outriggers as there are men.
45
s
t
a
n d
u
p
p
a d
d
l
e
m
a
g
u
k