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Canoe Polo is one of the best ways to refine your kayaking
skills in a safe environment. Rough to the eye,
it has all the action of a football game and yet is injury
free. It is a fast, energetic and extremely
skilful game that is played in swimming pools, combining
the ball skills of basketball and water polo with kayaking
skills for manoeuvrability.
Each team has up to eight players, with up to five being
on the playing field at any one time. The field
is 35 x 20 metres in size, with a goal suspended at each
end, suspended 2 metres above the water. The rules
are based on safety, allowing fast, exciting play, that
is very entertaining for spectators.
Each player paddles a specially designed kayak called a
"polo bat" that is up to 3 metres long. Players
in possession of the ball can be "tackled" by the opposition's
kayak, or "hand tackled" on the shoulder and capsized.
The ball is passed hand to hand as in water polo,
or flicked using the paddle. Paddles can also
be used to intercept passes and block shots at goal.
Canoe Polo has been played in Germany since the early 1920's.
The sport, like all other canoeing disciplines, really took
off with the advent of fibreglass. Canoe Polo is played
in every state of Australia in all major cities and many
country regions. The Australian Canoe Polo Committee
holds National Championships each year, for both Club and
State teams. A National League is also held
each year with modified rules to make the game even more
spectator friendly. The best place to
get local information about the game, is from your local
canoe association or canoe club. |
