Sports & Outdoors

How To Trim A Canoe

Environmental conditions will always be changing when canoeing; trimming is the way you move your body around the boat to counteract them. Sam, canoeing and kayaking instructor at the Leaside Educational Trust in Hackney, shows you how to counteract waves and wind by moving your body. Enlarge

How To Trim A Canoe

Environmental conditions will always be changing when canoeing; trimming is the way you move your body around the boat to counteract them. Sam, canoeing and kayaking instructor at the Leaside Educational Trust in Hackney, shows you how to counteract waves and wind by moving your body.

Top Tips

  • If the water you are in starts to get choppy you might want to move to the back of the boat; this will raise the front of the boat making it easier to paddle through waves.
  • If the conditions become windy you can move to the front of the boat; this will lower the front, helping you stay in a straight line.
  • You don't have to stay sitting down in a canoe; paddling on your knees will lower your centre of gravity giving you more manoeuvrability and allowing you to move faster, it also allows you to tilt the boat from side to side.