List of Boat Sports A-Z

List of Boat Sports

Boat sports cover a wide range of sporting activities all with one common trait: the use of a boat. Many of the most exciting and high-speed water sports involve a boat. There are a number of boat sports that are featured in the Olympics, such as rowing, sailing, canoeing, and kayaking. Meanwhile, others like fishing are largely individual activities and can take place anywhere at any time. Boat sports can take place in any number of different environments at different speeds, which means that anybody with a boat can find a sport suitable for them.

Many of these sports are high-speed and high-adrenaline, which results in boats that continue to get faster and faster. This has led to hydroplane racing boats being able to reach speeds of over 200 MPH. These high speeds make it all the more important for safety requirements to be followed in order for the sport to be as exciting as possible while minimizing the risk of injury.

Boat Sports List A to Z

  • Adventure Racing
  • Barefoot Skiing
  • Big-Game Fishing
  • Canoe Polo
  • Canoeing
  • Coastal and Offshore Rowing
  • Creeking
  • Deck Tennis
  • Dinghy Sailing
  • Drag Boat Racing
  • Dragon Boat Racing
  • F1 Powerboat Racing
  • Fastnet
  • Flyak
  • Gig Racing
  • Hydroplane Racing
  • Ice Yachting
  • Iceboating
  • Jet Ski Racing
  • Jet Sprint Boat Racing
  • Kayaking
  • Kneeboarding
  • Model Yacht Racing
  • Motorboat Racing
  • Naval Pentathlon
  • Offshore Powerboat Racing
  • Outrigger Canoeing
  • Parasailing
  • Playboating
  • Powerboat Racing
  • Quadrathlon
  • RC Racing
  • Rowing
  • Sailing
  • Sculling Rowing
  • Single Scull
  • Snowboating
  • Squirt Boating
  • Surf Kayaking
  • Surfboat Rowing
  • Sweep Rowing
  • Wakeboarding
  • Wakesurfing
  • Water Skiing
  • Whitewater Kayaking
  • Whitewater Rafting
  • Whitewater Slalom
  • Wild-Water Racing

FAQ

What are boat sports?

Boat sports are a subsection of water sports in that a boat requires water to be operated, although there are exceptions like snowboating. Boat sports can vary in terms of physical demands, objectives, and equipment. There’s a wide variation of boat sports, ranging from sports that feature high-speed powerboats to self-propelled rowboats to RC boats. There’s also sports like water-skiing, wakeboarding, and wakesurfing that aren't centered around the boat but rather a piece of equipment used to ride the boat’s wake.

Which boat sport features the fastest boats?

Hydroplane racing features the fastest boats in hydroplane speed boats. The goal of all these sports isn’t necessarily to always be the fastest, and many of these sports have different requirements as far as propulsion methods, but a hydroplane racing boat is capable of reaching speeds of over 200 MPH. The boats have a special design that features only three points of contact with the water, which allows the boat to effectively travel over the water without too much drag.

Some of the most popular boat sports in the world are fishing, kayaking, and rowing. Fishing requires very little in terms of boating technology, as any boat capable of floating can be fished off of. Kayaks can be used for races, although they are more commonly used to travel, explore, or for leisure. Both fishing and kayaking require only one person, making them easy to do alone and frequently, while rowing requires at least one other person to race.

What boat sports are in the Olympics?

There are several boat sports in the Olympics, including rowing, sailing, canoeing, and kayaking. Most of the boat sports featured in the Olympics are centered around the speed that humans can produce instead of an engine. On the other hand, sailing is more focused on the technique of operating the boat in combination with the wind instead of forcefully propelling it forward. Rowing is among the oldest Olympic sports, having been featured for the first time for men in 1900 and women in 1976.