July 17 - Garden Island Championship & Kaua'i Update
Well, Kaua'i really does have regattas.. The Garden Island Canoe Racing Association held this years championship regatta this past saturday in Hanalei bay. The weekends winning teams have qualified to paddle in the State Championship in August.
[Photos]
[we patiently await the results from GICRA]
Earlier regattas of the season have gone by quick and sadly without much mention outside of Kauai's paddling community. To sum it up, the Kauai regatta season is like every other island, except we race half miles most of the time and never bring out the Koa canoes. Not to criticize the race officials, they do a fine job, but I think we could all put a bit more effort into making Kaua'i more competitive on the State level.
Posted by keizo on Wed, 07/21/2004 - 11:42pm
I would also commend any volunteer officials, BUT, to keep the sport growing, we need world wide exposure, not to mention the current paddlers that want to keep score or have basemarks to shoot for. Remembering that perception is reality to the individual, the outward perception is that the Kauai results are a secret and possibly they don't want exposure. One could possibly argue that there had to be a prior conscience decision to not release any information, one would then ask why? In radio outrigger updates every week this summer in other parts of the state, it has sounded as though Kauai doesn't have any races. On Ocpadller.com it has looked as though the only race the rest of the year on Kauai is the Na Pali Challenge. HMMM
Small Kine Mana`o
RB
#1 Thu, 07/22/2004 - 12:01pm
We've been training hard and racing hard but the regattas have become so meaningless that a lot of the top kauai one man paddlers don't show up. Every race we show up excited and thinking that we are going to race one mile and every race at about 11:00 right as the 16s are racing they say that all races will be half a mile. I dont understand how every other island can race one mile but Kauai doesn't have time to... i put a lot of thought into it, wondering if maybe because of Kauai's position we have shorter days than the other islands which would necissitate shorter races, but alas... no, there is absolutely no reason why kauai should race half mile races while every other island races one mile. Also I think keizo has asked for someone to send him the results at every race, and they always say they will and they never do... just some complaints.. all you outer island people, dont take your mile races and fun regattats for granted.. i have a lot a lot a lot of respect for the race officials, i could never organize or run a regatta, but please next year can we have mile races.. and maybe also a point system like maui where other regattas are important besides the final one.
#2 Thu, 07/22/2004 - 8:04pm