Surf Kayaking World Championships 2022

By Aisling Griffin

The Surf Kayaking World Championships took place in Bude Cornwall from the 30th of September to the 8th of October At the Championships there are two competitions the individual competition and the team competition. In both of these competitions there is short boat and long boat categories. Short Boat is shorter than 3 meters in length with fins and perform similar to surfboards. Long Boat is a kayak over 3 meters in length with no fins. They surf like a long board.

Surf Kayakers are judged in a 19 minute heat were their best 2 waves count. Judges are looking for, radical controlled manoeuvres in the most critical section of the wave on the biggest and/or best waves

The competition windows was held over a 8 day period. Surf conditions for the 8 days were very mixed. Some competition time was loss due to poor conditions and resulted in heats being cut to 14 minutes. Luckily there were some lovely sunny days with good surf.

The Irish Team came in hard fought 3rd place in the team competition. There was some solid performances from the whole team to get this result. We had some fantastic results in the individual. Brigitte Egan won the world title in master long and 2nd in masters short, Anthony Coyne came 2nd in grand master. Ian Power came 2nd in master long. Tieran Haynes at his very first world championships came an incredible 4th in Junior Short. Also in the individual there was also a lot of strong quarter and semi final finishes. Well done to everyone who competed.