Royal Navy Kayakers make a splash in the history books

The Royal Navy have won the Freestyle Kayak Inter-Services competition for the first time in history.

Over 40 competitors from the Armed Forces took part in the event, three of whom (two RAF and one Army) are on the elite athlete programme.

Despite their fierce competition, the Royal Navy managed to outscore overall and claim individual bronze medals in the Extreme Slalom (Toby Evans) and Freestyle (Caleb Newsome and Charlotte Fife).

Team member and Royal Navy Paddlesport Association (RNPA) Performance Coach & Comittee member, Lt Cdr Oliver Taylor-Wood said, ‘This is the first ever win by the Royal Navy in a sport discipline which requires substantial prior experience in paddlesport to be able to compete, you must be able to paddle on whitewater before you can learn freestyle moves.

‘We also frequently struggle comparatively to other services in releasing enough personnel for training and competition, emphasising the dedication from across the team to this year’s Inter-Service success.’

The RNPA team of 14 was the largest inter-service team fielded in paddlesport for some time and shows the results of a tangible uptake in whitewater kayaking across the Royal Navy over the last 24 months.

The activity has been supported by both Adventurous Training (AT) and Sport funding and will hopefully continue to be supported going forward.

Oliver said, ‘there is a real opportunity to become a ‘service powerhouse’ on the inter-service stage in Whitewater, Freestyle and new Olympic Extreme Slalom disciplines with the right infrastructure and support in place.

‘The success is almost certainly a result of RNPA/AT/Sport collaboration through Project RAPID whitewater development over the last 18 months (including Ex RAPID RHONE, Ex RAPID OETZ, EX RAPID TRYWERYN and Ex RAPID ZAMBEZI) and shows the Sport benefits of pragmatically linking AT and Sport funding and activity though Paddlesport.’

If you want to get involved, contact your local PTI/ATI or get in touch for more details.

There is a real opportunity to become a ‘service powerhouse’ on the inter-service stage in Whitewater, Freestyle and new Olympic Extreme Slalom disciplines with the right infrastructure and support in place.