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Veteran waka ama paddler Laurie (Skin) Atkins brought home a silver medal after competing in a world distance championship event in Samoa last month.
Competing in the Masters 70 Men single waka (V1) 12 kilometre race, the 72 year-old from Pākiri bested contestants representing American Samoa, Canada, Brazil, Hawai’i and the United States to take second place, behind Australia’s Tony Compton.
“I was very happy with my placing and how I raced but was disappointed that our race course was changed at the last minute,” Atkins says. “We were meant to race out in the open ocean but it got changed to the harbour where it was flat and calm.”
Atkins says that was a shame because he usually excels in conditions of wind and swells, where a paddler’s skill is needed to control the rudderless single waka.
“On the flat and calm it’s just a drag race!”
With 27 countries taking part, the 3rd IVF Va’a World Distance Championships, hosted by the Samoa Outrigger Canoe Club, was a triumph for New Zealand paddlers, who topped the medal tally with eight gold, 13 silver and three bronze medals.
Atkins, a member of the Tapara L Trust waka club, trains at Omaha and Pākiri beaches.
Highlights of a 25-year paddling career include holding the national long-distance title for eight years, and taking the gold in the Masters singles division of the Queen Liliuokalani, the world’s biggest outrigger canoe race, in Hawai’i in 2004.
Atkins, a former jiu jutsu and rugby coach, says waka ama has expanded his horizons, offering opportunities for friendships with other paddlers across the world, some of whom he has visited in their home countries.
He was thinking about calling it a day after Samoa, he says, but after hearing that the next world champs will be held in Brazil in two years’ time, “I don’t know if I’ll be retiring just yet”.
