QLD
1344 posts
Debate:
The now:Australia has at the moment so many top flight elite paddlers that at any event in the world an aussie could win and always are in the top 3 if not taking all the places in the top 3. We have a stack of names that you associate with the term "best paddlers in the world"
The future: Australia has a non exsistant junior devlopment base. what happens in 10/15 years for the elite racing side of sport in aus? We have been lucky i think from the start of the sport we have had a dozen or more athletes in there 20's and 30's who have taken up the sport that are true athletes and ocean men/women and have succeeded on the world stage.
Theres only been a few teenagers come through like matty nottage, lincoln, jake, trev. and maybe a couple
More ive missed.
I dont see or hear of any organised junior devlopment training squads and never see junior racers besides social ones and they are usually 10yrs or younger..
Where are the teenagers in our sport? Theres 1000's of teenagers out surfing each day and 1000's of kids at SLSC training groups each day, 1000's of teenagers in school rowing teams all around aus so there is no shortage of kids who are water and ocean confident that could pick up a paddle grasp the techinque and turn into elite teenage paddlers
The U.S i see via special media has a flood of juniors coming through, they have proper training squads and hold serious junior racers all the time.
The way I see it, in 5/10 years there will be a stack of US teenage kids at the elite level winning some of the biggest racers in the world And leaving the aussie dominance behind
What is missing in Australia?????
873 posts
Same issue here - I think you'll have to wait until your current paddlers have teenagers.....sport too expensive and perhaps not sexy enough to attract the teenagers at present. Dedicated programmes with schools is something we are looking at.
QLD
19804 posts
I would like to see some of the surf board club juniors have a go.
not sup surf. that's for old people. but get them on race boards training as part of their fitness, ins and outs on small crappy days
teach dwing which im sure if they knew how much fun its they would be in it.
especially on crap surf windy days.
work with the board clubs, don't steal their juniors for sup surfing.
the good thing would be is they are already competitive by nature
QLD
4177 posts
The world beach games are on in 2017 which sup will be a part
Events like that will be great for attracting youngsters, we havea lot of competing sports in this sport mad land. I reckon for the sport to thrive for juniors the only logical step would be to add it to the existing surf life saving movement.
