Disciplines

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Canoeing has many specialist areas which offer great variety and opportunities for people with different preferences and needs to all get involved in some aspect of paddlesport - both competitive and recreational.  If your preferred disciplines is not listed here, please contact us for more information or to give us a contact point to advertise.

Slalom

Canoe slalom is one of the most spectacular watersports, demanding skill, stamina and courage. The aim is to run a rapid river course marked by "gates" fast, and without touching.

A "gate" is two poles, suspended over the water. Green and white gates are negotiated in a downstream direction, red and white gates upstream. The gates are placed so that you must make tricky cross-current moves and use the eddies and waves,

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Canoe Polo

Canoe Polo is one of the eight disciplines of canoeing persued in the UK, known simply as "polo" by its officionados. Polo combines paddling and ball handling skills with an exciting contact team game, where tactics and positional play are as important as the speed and fitness of the individual athletes.

The game requires excellent teamwork and promotes both general canoeing skills as well as a range of other techniques unique to the sport. Two teams each with five players on the pitch at any one time (and up to three substitutes) compete to score goals in their opponent's net which is suspended 2 metres above the water. The ball can be thrown by hand, or flicked with the paddle. Pitches can be set up in swimming pools or any stretch of flat water.

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Open Canoeing

The Open Canoe Association, founded in 1956, is affiliated to the BCU and is an Association of canoeing clubs and individual members from across the UK. It exists to promote the open canoe as an all round, versatile craft, which can be used on placid, moving, white and open water

 

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Freestyle Kayaking

 

Freestyle is the most exciting, most dynamic most unique thing you can do in a boat. It’s Gymnastics in a kayak. Freestyle paddlers, in tiny specialist boats will search out features on fast flowing rivers; White Water with a big standing wave or a retentive hydraulic with a tow back is what they are looking for.  When they find it they will test this feature & their skills to the limit.  These features with names like ‘Bus Eater’ & ‘Big Kahuna’ can be intimidating but the sense of exhilaration that paddlers get when pulling off huge moves is unrivalled.