Personal Skills Coaching

 At ABC Kayaking, personal coaching is built around one simple idea:

Better technique starts with understanding how you move.

With 30 years of personal kayaking experience and 20 years of teaching, I have spent a large part of my career looking at what actually makes a difference to performance on the water.

My approach combines that practical experience with my degree-level study in coaching and outdoor leadership, alongside a strong understanding of human movement and exercise science.

This allows me to look beyond simply saying “move your body this way” or “do the stroke like this.”

Instead, I look at you — your posture, balance, rotation, connection, timing and movement — and how those movements interact with your boat and blade.

Kayaking technique can sometimes come down to very small changes in body position or movement.

A slight adjustment can change how effectively you connect with the water, how your boat responds, how much power you can generate and how efficiently you can transfer that power through the stroke.

That's what personal coaching is about.

I analyse your movement and identify the things that are really making a difference — then help you understand them, feel them and build them into your paddling.

My coaching has developed through decades of paddling and teaching across different environments, from my early experience in sea and surf kayaking through to more than a decade of inland kayaking.

I've worked with different boats, blades, paddling styles and environments, and that experience has shaped an approach that looks at the whole system:

Body → Boat → Blade → Water

Rather than teaching a technique as a fixed movement, I look at why it works for you, and what needs to change to make it more effective.

It may be a different way of looking at kayaking, but it is an approach that has worked for me throughout my career — and one I have developed through years of coaching others.

There is no one perfect movement that works identically for every paddler.

Your body, your experience, your boat and your goals are unique.

That's why personal coaching is exactly that — personal.

Whether you want to improve efficiency, develop more power, refine your technique, gain greater control or simply understand your paddling at a deeper level, the coaching is built around your movement and your goals.

30 years on the water.
20 years teaching.
Academic coaching and outdoor leadership experience.
A technical understanding of kayaking.

And a coaching approach built around understanding how you move.

Let's find the movements that make the difference.