Get your canoes, kayaks, surf skis and dragon boats ready
By Katelyn Boulanger, as originally published in The Selkirk Record
The Red River Paddle Challenge is back for its fourth annual paddling event on the Red River.
“The Red River Paddle Challenge is a marathon distance, paddling race or challenge, which starts in Winnipeg at the St Vital Park and goes downstream north all the way to the Half Moon Drive In in Lockport. It’s open to any paddle crafts or human-powered boats–canoes, kayaks, paddleboards. We’ve got dragon boats, rowing boats, basically, if you can paddle it, you can race it in the event,” said Brad Friesen, Red River Paddle Challenge Race Director.
The challenge started in 2019 but COVID-19 did change the way that the race has operated for the past few years.
“Our second year, 2020, that’s when COVID was at its height and in 2021, we had to make some changes. We spread out the start time for everyone to just maintain as much distance as they can. But right now, we’re back to normal as far as COVID restrictions go with one big mass start. We’ll have all the boats, over 100 boats on the water. The start of the race is chaotic. It’ll be awesome,” he said.
Friesen says that the original idea for this event started when he, as a paddleboard racer who travelled across North America to race in distance events, wanted to be able to say that we had something like this in our own community.
“There was nothing like there here in Manitoba and even Canada doesn’t really have too many events of this type, unless you go up to say the Yukon, there’s the famous Yukon River Quest. And, people are always asking about it,” he said.
Since its inception, the race has really taken off with paddlers coming in from all over Canada from B.C. to Southern Ontario and even people from the U.S. making their way to the Red River.
Even though some of the participants that come are competitive athletes, Friesen wants to assure people that this is an event for anyone who thinks they can go the distance which is why they’ve enphasized challenge in the name instead of race.
“For some people, the challenge is to just finish themselves. Like running a marathon, if you sign up for the Manitoba Marathon, how many people sign up thinking, ‘Oh, I’m gonna win this.’? Most peoplejust sign it to complete it or have a personal goal,” said Friesen.
He says that even though getting a large event like this together is a lot of work each year, it’s all worth it on race day.
“To see the participants at the start in the morning, it can be intense for some, as well, as you know, there’s a lot of nerves, people are nervous and unsure what to expect. And then it’s complete, it’s just awesome. When you get to the finish line, you see people finish, the smiles on their faces, and how proud everyone is of themselves for completing the challenge,” said Friesen.
He invited anyone who’s interested to sign up via the Red River Paddle Challenge website and come out to the event. You can also learn more about the race and see a documentary about it on the website https://www.redriverpaddlechallenge.com/.