On Day 1 (Saturday) is the 10km V6 Mens Womens and Mixed Race and Day 2 is a V1 10km and 250m and 500m sprint races for V6 for both novice and experienced paddlers and V1 sprints.

There are 3 major races held on Aitutaki every year, the other two races link in well for paddlers heading over to Rarotonga for the Vaka Eiva in November – The first one – Round Aitutaki is a 56km changeover race held outside the reef, held the weekend before the Vaka Eiva.
The Motu to Motu is held the Monday following the Vaka Eiva and is a shorter distance 35km V6 relay race racing between some of the 14 islands within the Aitutaki Lagoon.

I was lucky to paddle with Aitutaki Oe Vaka, one of three local clubs on Aitutaki. I steered their local open mens team.
The wind was pretty strong over the weekend up to 40 knots and I found the 10km V1 rudderless race one of the most challenging races I have done.

One of the purposes of the trip was to also help out local paddlers with paddle building for their club members, on Rarotonga Brent Fisher is building club paddles as the junior paddler numbers are increasing rapidly and on Aitutaki, TK from Toa Moana Club is doing the same.

Its awesome to see that paddling is so strong in the Cook Islands, the Aitutaki Oe Vaka Rangatahi are aiming to attend our National Waka Ama Sprints in January 2012, and many other top paddlers are training hard for the South Pacific Games in Noumea in August

Air Rarotonga flies to Aitutaki 3-4 times a day – the flight costs between $100 - $300 depending on availability
Maevatini Race also has a webpage
http://oevakaaitutaki.blogspot.com/2010/06/vaka-maevatini-2010-race-results-day-2.html

Thanks very much for the following people for their help and hospitality,
Alex Webb, Terangi and Junior Tamati and all the Aitutaki paddlers, Air Rarotonga www.airraro.com, Steve from Ranginui’s Retreat www.ranginuisretreat.com, Fletcher Melvin from Island Craft Ltd www.islandcraft.com and Victoria and Reuben Dearlove

Kia ora koutou
Conan Herbert

Photos and Results are attached are from Maevatini 2011