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You are here: Home / Canoe Racing / About the Canoes

About the Canoes

2008 Macfarlane 038 crop

The Outrigger Canoe Club is fortunate to have owned seven koa canoes since its founding in 1908. These canoes are part of our heritage as a Club, as well as our culture and history as Hawaiians, whether by blood or spirit. These koa canoes are our legacy. Our membership has cherished this heritage and continues to care for and love these canoes which have given us so much pleasure over the past century.

Koa canoes are most prized by canoe racing clubs and are required for racing in the Hawaiian Canoe Racing Association and Oahu Hawaiian Canoe Racing Association.

The Outrigger Canoe Club’s oldest koa canoe, the Hanekeoki, was acquired when the Club was formed, and was OCC’s earliest racing canoe. The Club used it in the first two Moloka`i to Oahu canoe races that it entered. In February 1936, the Club acquired the koa racing canoes Kakina and Leilani which are still used today. In the 1980s the Outrigger won a koa log for scoring the most points in the Oahu Hawaiian Canoe Racing Association regatta season, and member/canoe builder Joe Quigg built the Kaoloa in which the Club won the Molokai race in 1986. After major renovations of its two 80-plus year old koa canoes the Kakina and Leilani and its 30-year-old Kaoloa, the Outrigger Canoe Club has three state-of-the-art koa racing canoes.

The Club has also owned the koa racing canoe Paoa, as well as the koa canoes Ka Moi and Stephanie.

After the Tahitians came to Hawaii in the 1970s to race in the Moloka`i to Oahu race with their lightweight fiberglass canoes, member Tom Conner built the first fiberglass racing canoe used by the OCC, the Manu`ula. Since that time, the Club has raced in a variety of fiberglass canoes from the original Malia-mold canoes to the Hawaiian Class Racing Canoe to today’s newer, lightweight glass canoes.

In addition to racing, Outrigger also owns a number of surfing canoes which members use in the surf breaks surrounding the Club.  These canoes are the Dad, named for long-time Club Captain and Olympic swimming Coach George “Dad” Center and the Cline, named for Cline Mann, the father of modern-day paddleboard racing, former Club president and active member of the Club’s sailing program. There are also the Pu`eone and the Kakela which are named for surfing locations in front of the Club.

To learn more about our canoes, see below.


Koa Canoes

Non-Koa Canoes

Surfing Canoes

Naming Our Canoes

Evolution of the Ama

Rigging an Outrigger Canoe

Wa`a Kauhaki

OCC Magazine Articles

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