| Backrest | A strap that supports your back when you’re sitting in a kayak. |
| Backsurf | Surfing backwards, when your stern’s pointing down the wave. |
| BCU | British Canoe Union – the national governing body for canoeing in the UK. |
| Break | A spot which forms ocean surf waves to form. |
| Buoyancy aid | Usually a vest or jacket, a buoyancy aid is made from foam and helps you float so you can rescue yourself more easily. It differs from a lifejacket in that it will not keep your head above water if you’re unconscious. |
| CANI | Canoe Association of Northern Ireland. |
| Canoe | A generic term for boats without rudders propelled by paddles. A more specific meaning is a boat that is knelt in and propelled by a single bladed paddle. |
| Capsize | When a canoe turns completely upside down. |
| Carbon fibre | Often used to make paddles, helmets and competition boats, carbon is light and stiff, but also quite expensive and can be fragile. |
| Cartwheel | A playboating move where the boat spins round the paddler in the vertical plane. |
| Carve | One of the best ways to move around a wave is to use a boat’s rails to carve around. |
| Coach | A canoeing instructor. |
| Cockpit | The hole through which you get into your canoe. |
| Creekboat | A round, blunt boat that’s designed to make steep and difficult drops safer. |
| Creeking | River paddling which involves steep technical rivers. |
| Earplugs | Often worn by paddlers to keep water out of their ears and so prevent any hearing loss that may occur from repeated flushes of cold water. |
| Eskimo roll | A means of righting a boat after a capsize using a paddle and a strong hip flick |
| Feather | The angle at which kayak paddles are opposed to each other |
| Fins | Used on surf kayak and making their way onto playboats, fins help paddlers to carve hard when they’re surfing. |
| Flat spin | A basic freestyle move that can be performed in a wave or hole. |
| Flat water | A body of water with no rapids in it – lakes or slow moving rivers. |
| Flood | Flood conditions can make a normally easy river very dangerous. |
| Freestyle | The competitive discipline of playboating. |
| Gate | Two poles hung over a river during a slalom competition. The course will pass through all the gates. |
| Grade | A system for categorising the difficulties of a rapid. |
| Hasler | The divisional system used for UK marathon racing. Division 9 is the slowest category while Div 1 is the fastest. |
| Hatch | A waterproof way of accessing storage areas in sea or touring kayaks. |
| Haystack | A very steep wave. |
| Helmet | Worn to protect your head from rocks, paddles and other bad things. It’s essential that you helmet fits well and covers your forehead. |
| High Performance | A class of surf boat in competitions that’s shorter and rewards more varied moves than international class. |
| Hole | A water feature where water moving downstream is countered by water rushing back upstream to meet it. |
| Hotdogging | Another word for freestyle. |
| Hypaion | The rubber that a raft’s made from. |
| International class | A long, fast surf boat class that’s recognised in competitions. |
| Kayak | A type of canoe which is sat in and propelled with a double bladed paddle. |
| Kevlar | A hard wearing material that is very strong and light. Often used in competition boats and helmets. |
| Leptospirosis | A rare but serious illness that can be picked up from rat’s urine in river and lake water. |
| Lightning | Pyranha’s plastic marathon/sprint boat for children and small paddlers. |
| Loop/air loop | A freestyle move where a paddler pulls a forwards somersault in a hole. |
| Noseclips | Often worn by playboaters to keep water out of their noses. |
| Overfall | See ‘tidal race’. |
| Park and huck | Destination creek boating. This involves parking in one place and paddling one waterfall or rapid without travelling too far downriver. |
| Park and play | Destination playboating. This involves parking on one place and playboating on specific feature without travelling downstream. |
| Pin | When a boat is stuck against something in a river. Pinning against rocks or trees can be dangerous if you’re underwater at the time. |
| Playboating | Using river features to pull off acrobatic tricks in a boat. |
| Playspot | A location that’s particularly suitable for playboating, usually a wave or hole. |
| Polo | Canoe polo is a team game where five paddlers on each team have to score goals by throwing the ball through the opposing team’s net. |
| Portage | Either the act of carrying your boat around a rapid or obstruction or something that you choose to portage. |
| Raft | An inflatable boat which can be taken down whitewater rivers. |
| Rapid | Caused when a river flows downhill, the steeper the gradient the more difficult the rapid. |
| Rudder | Usually fitted to the back of a marathon or sprint boat and controlled by a foot pedal or foot operated steering bar. |
| SCA | Scottish Canoeing Associations. |
| Skiffle | Disturbance caused by water flowing over shallow shingle beds on a riverbed. |
| Slalom | A discipline of canoeing that involves competitions racing through a series of gates hung over a river. |
| Spate | A river which has been brought up to flood levels by heavy rain. |
| Spray deck | A neoprene flap that paddlers wear round their waists and fit into their boat’s cockpit. |
| Squirt | a) A move where a boat is stood vertically on its stern
b) A type of paddling that involves paddling a very low volume boat that’s designed to use river currents to sink the entire boat and its paddler below the water’s surface – the Mystery Move. |
| Star test | The personal skills certifications awarded by the BCU. 1* is introductory whereas 5* certifies advanced leadership. |
| Stopper | A more severe hole. Stoppers can hold canoes or swimmers in them if they’re particularly bad. |
| Surf | a) Riding the face of a wave in a kayak. The force of gravity pulling the kayak down the wave is countered by the speed of the wave pushing it up the wave.
b) A discipline of kayaking that concentrates on riding ocean waves. |
| Tandem | A canoe paddled by two people |
| T-grip | The end of a canoe paddle that isn’t a blade. |
| Throwline | A bag full of floating line that cab be thrown to a paddler or swimmer in difficulty. |
| Tidal race | A type of rapid caused when tides force water through a gap or over shallows, causing turbulence. |
| Vertical moves | Playboating moves which involve standing the kayak on one end. |
| Waterfall | Formed when water flows over a vertical drop. An integral part of creeking. |
| Wave | Found on a river or in the sea, waves are often surfable in a boat. |
| Waveski | A surfboard that you sit on top of and use a paddle to control. |
| WCA | Welsh Canoeing Association. |
| Well’s disease | An advanced case of Leptospirosis. |
| Weir | A man made structure that backs water into a pool above it. Can often form a dangerous stopper below it. |
| Wetsuit | More popular with rafters than with canoeists, wetsuits are made from neoprene rubber and keep the wearer warm even when they’re wet. |
| Whitewater | The features that form on steep rivers, including rapids and waterfalls. |
| Wings | Flatwater and Wild Water racing paddles with a a pronounced lip along the top of the paddles to stop water spilling. |
