SET TO MAKE A SPLASH

Small sprinters: Paddlers from the Horouta, YMP and Mareikura waka ama clubs sprint in a 250-metre race at Gisborne in the girls' midget class last year. The three clubs are sending crews to the waka ama sprint national championships at Karapiro next week. File picture by Paul Rickard

SCORES of paddlers from Tairawhiti are poised to make a splash at the waka ama sprint national championships next week.

The champs at Lake Karapiro begin tomorrow, starting with a powhiri and the youngest competitors having their first races, before paddlers in the more senior divisions get under way in their events later in the week.

Tairawhiti clubs Horouta, Mareikura and YMP will all have a strong presence.

Horouta Waka Hoe president Walton Walker said more than 200 paddlers from the club would make the trip to Karapiro and compete across the range of classes, from the midgets — for children aged five to nine — to the masters' categories.

Horouta, the national champions, have entered 32 teams, including 20 in the junior divisions.

More than 50 paddlers from the club would also compete in individual events, Walker said.

Crews to watch out for included the Kaiarahi Toa open women's team, the Woolley Kumara open men's team and a midgets' crew known as the Beauden Barretts.

The chance to qualify for this year's world championships in Hawaii provided an incentive for paddlers to work hard and get in good form, Walker said.

Funding from the New Zealand Community Trust and sponsor Self Storage Gisborne had helped make the large campaign affordable for the club.

Walker expected Mareikura and YMP to provide strong competition in many of the races.

Mareikura Waka Ama stalwart Raipoia Brightwell said the club would have about 80 paddlers at Karapiro, as well as family support.

They had 13 teams and the individual events helped to develop sound all-round paddlers, she said.

Mareikura had a boost last month when Tahitian coach Tamatoa Perez spent a week in the city providing tuition.

“It really helped us bring a bit more quality to our training,” Brightwell said.

The programme reinforced a sense of togetherness, she said.

One thing Perez emphasised was that the sport was a race between canoes, not just paddlers, and the athletes had to get the best out of their boats by being attuned to the water and learning to “glide” across it.

Brightwell saw the nationals as part of a broader campaign for the club, with events such as the Takapuna Beach Cup Waka Ama Race to come next month, the world club sprint champs in Hawaii in August and, next year, the long-distance world champs in Samoa.

YMP Waka Ama club captain Nancy Tarawa said the club would have about 80 paddlers at the nationals and they had entered 13 teams, including five in the midgets' division.

Paddlers in the junior-16 and J19 divisions had been training five or six days a week in the lead-up to the event, she said.

The 2020 Te Wananga o Aotearoa National Sprint Championships will run for a week.

Over 2000 female and 1700 male competitors have registered.

Over 50 clubs are taking part and more than half of the paddlers will compete in the three youngest age-group categories — midgets, intermediate and J16.

Horouta have won the trophy for accumulating the most points in eight of the past nine national champs.