Olympic Canoeing
Although canoeing or kayaking is one of the oldest human activities, men's canoeing was not added to the Olympic competition in 1936 while women's paddling had to wait to be included until 1948. In Olympic canoeing there are two kinds of races and two kinds of craft.
Races
One is Canoe/Kayak flat water racing. That is when the water is calm and the race is to see who finishes first. There are teams of one or more that race together.
The other is slalom racing, where teams or individuals compete on either a natural body of water, usually a river, or increasingly, on a man made stretch of water. Events are split over distances of 250m to 400m, with competitors trying to avoid touching the series of 18 to 25 gates with their paddle, boat, head or body.
Craft
In the canoes there are one and two-person disciplines, while the kayaks have one, two and four-person disciplines.
Individuals or crews in the canoe events must kneel and use a single-bladed paddle, while kayak competitors sit and use a double-bladed paddle.
Olympic events
Kayaks can have a one, two, or four person crew. Both men and women can race in the Kayak flat water and Kayak slalom racing but there are only men’s competitions for Canoe flat water and slalom racing.
In the summer Olympics there are twelve events in total, nine for men and three for women. An attempt is being made to get winter kayaking, Inuit style, into the winter Olympic calendar, possibly in combination with a shooting event.
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