Del Likes Kayaking

Why do people take part in freestyle kayaking? Quite simply because it is fun. As the 2022 freestyle kayaking world championships are kicking off, there is a huge amount of excitement in the paddling world about freestyle kayaking right now. With such a strong focus on the championships and the talented athletes who are competing, it would be easy to forget that this is just one layer of the freestyle kayaking community. But freestyle kayaking is for everyone, no matter your ability. It is a sport for anyone who wants to have fun.

Prior to the start of the world championships, the International Canoe Federation (ICF) organise a development freestyle camp. This development camp is a fantastic 6-day camp aimed at developing aspiring freestyle paddlers. In this article, I want to share with you what happens during the development camp and why it is so important for the growth of freestyle kayaking in the wider community.

Recently I have completed a trilogy of articles around the upcoming freestyle kayaking world championships in Nottingham. I chose to write these articles to help raise awareness of what the freestyle kayaking worlds are, what the different categories are and the profiles of some of the junior GB athletes competing.

Following these articles, Alex McClure, who is an Irish squirt paddler, got in contact with me. She wanted to know whether I would be keen to do a piece about the Irish team. Of course, with the Irish team being such an awesome group of lovely people and phenomenal paddlers, I said yes! With Alex’s help, I’ve recruited a few of the Irish paddlers to let them tell you about their team!

With the freestyle kayaking world championships coming to Nottingham this June, I decided to write a trilogy of articles around freestyle. My first article was about the world championships themselves and all the details of how to get involved. My second article was explaining what the different disciplines are within freestyle – with some help from members of the senior GB freestyle team. But there is one group of individuals who I haven’t yet mentioned and they are the juniors. This article will provide a chance to get to know four members of the GB junior freestyle kayaking as they prepare to represent their country next month!

I recently wrote an article about the upcoming freestyle world championships to highlight what an exciting event that will soon be coming to Nottingham! Whilst this article was a great way to give people an overview of the event, I didn’t get the chance to go into detail about each of the different freestyle categories. With some help from a few well-known faces in kayaking, this article is going to do just that!