Canoeing or surfing? Photo: ISA
In lineups everywhere, stand-up paddlers cop a lot of shit. Something about being able to sit way out the back, see sets before everyone else, and catch more waves. Go figure.
Like it or not, though, few surfers would dispute that SUPing a derivative of the sport of kings in the same way that, say, hydrofoiling is. If it walks like a surfboard and talks like a surfboard, etc.
Over the past several years, though, the International Surfing Association and the International Canoe Federation have been embroiled in a governance dispute – both laying claim to the sport of stand-up paddling.
In an interview with the New York Times last year, Simon Toulson, secretary general of the International Canoe Federation, told the New York Times, “Especially on flat water, propulsion using a paddle is basically canoeing. Standing up or sitting down is irrelevant.”
How happy the nay-sayers would be if stand-up paddling were renamed stand-up canoeing or SUC.
With surfing’s recent inclusion in the Olympics, the dispute over SUP has clear Olympic undertones.
And the ISA refuses to back down – going so far as to say the ICF is spreading misinformation, including claiming they are acting out of the best interests of the athletes.
“As a matter of fact, the ICF has yet to organize any world championship or even international SUP events. These are factual, historical and on the record matters,” said ISA President Fernando Aguerre in a statement.
“We also must question the ICF’s true commitment to the interest of the athletes practicing SUP. Contrary to their denials, if it were not for interventions by ICF, SUP would have been included in the sports program of the 2018 Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires. We had a great plan, an amazing venue and we had been in advanced discussions with the Buenos Aires organizers and the IOC Sports Department, but the ICF’s objections caused all that momentum to be lost.
“In doing so, the ICF deprived young athletes from around the world the opportunity on the world’s greatest youth sporting stage and thus fundamentally prevented the development of SUP.”
Ouch.
The ISA is eager to settle the governance dispute in the Court for Arbitration of Sport, but, as Aguerre explains, the ICF has been less than cooperative.
“The ICF has also not respected a process agreed with the IOC, including refusing to accept that the fundamental question of governance – a question which all the stakeholders are eager to answer – is put before CAS Arbitration,” Aguerre said. “Instead, the ICF is proposing that the only subject of discussion at CAS Arbitration be the legal basis of an IF’s exclusivity to govern a sport. The ISA is ready and eager to take this question to CAS, as agreed with the IOC, but our petition to ICF’s lawyers has now gone unanswered since May 2nd. These facts have never been mentioned by the ICF in any of their SUP related communications.”
The ISA’s scathing press release comes in light of the ICF’s upcoming 2018 Stand-Up Paddling World Championships, an event the ISA believes the ICF has no business holding.
Casper Steinfath, Danish four-time SUP World Champion and ISA Vice President, explained the whole thing is, “frustrating and confusing to the athletes to see the ICF organizing a so-called World Championship without any history or experience in the sport. “As far as I know, he said, “and based on the elite athletes with whom I compete and interact with on a daily basis, no one is taking this event seriously.”
