Birthdate: March 7th, 1967
Hometown: Ottawa, Ontario
Ian started paddling at the age of 16 when a visionary high school math teacher and swim coach encouraged a band of interested kids give up their March break in order to make their own fiberglass kayaks out of a club old and learn to slalom paddle. They competed in a few races around Ontario. After years of developing his skills in kayak, C1 and canoe he became fascinated with what was then called ‘Rodeo’ and began to compete at the very inception of the sport. He has competed in New Zealand as the Canadian C1 champion placing tenth overall. After the upcoming Worlds Ian will have represented Canada in all four disciplines of the sport. His early exposure to kayak building helped him develop his own cutting edge competition boats, some of which were pivotal to the development of freestyle paddling and boat design. More recently Ian has discovered the joy of squirt boating and devotes most of his on water time to exploring the depths of the sport. Ian enjoys traveling and paddling with his wife and teenage son and is looking forward to a Caledonian adventure with them next summer.
