“The lack of diversity in whitewater paddling isn’t a problem,” said Antoinette Lee Toscano, co-founder of Diversify Whitewater.
“No one’s going to die if we don’t go whitewater kayaking.”
That said, a day on the river can be nourishing for soul, mind, and body. And Diversify Whitewater, a nonprofit organization in Northern Colorado founded by Toscano and Lily Durkee, is working to bring the good vibes of river running to more people of different backgrounds and cultures.
With help from other national and local organizations, Diversify Whitewater organizes community paddling events and skills training for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC). By creating a welcoming environment for BIPOC and allies, they are expanding a community that has traditionally drawn primarily white participants.
The lack of diversity in outdoor sports in general has been tracked by researchers and industry organizations—but an upswing was noted in the 2024 Outdoor Participation Report. Still, there remains a gap between the diversity of outdoor participants and the diversity of the U.S. population.
Durkee, an Asian American Ph.D. student in ecology at Colorado State University, said that she saw very few other people of color kayaking when she started as a child on the East Coast. Although she didn’t take much notice of that at the time, the absence of BIPOC in the sport became conspicuous to her when she encountered another Chinese paddler while competing in events in Eastern Europe as a teenager.
“The only other Chinese person I saw was married to one of the coaches,” Durkee said. “She came up to me because she was so excited to see me and invited me to come home with her.”
For Toscano, an 11-year U.S. Army veteran and freelance writer, rejecting perceived limitations to who can engage in paddlesports extends to those with different physical abilities as well.
Toscano discovered kayaking when she was recovering from a broken back resulting from her military service. She signed up for a recreational therapy program offered by Team River Runner, an organization that teaches paddlesports to veterans and their families.
“I came to the sport when I was 45,” she said. “I have a friend who was blown up in Iraq and I’d say 80 percent to 90 percent of his spine is metal. And he whitewater kayaks. We don’t believe in limitations because of differing abilities.”
Spurred to action by an Immersion Research blog post
Durkee and Toscano were compelled to start Diversify Whitewater in summer 2020 after John and Kara Weld at Immersion Research (IR) published a blog, “A Letter to Our Customers Regarding the BLM Movement,” in response to the Black Lives Matter protests against systemic racism in the U.S.
The IR blog pointed out that “any discussion about racism in paddlesports inevitably begins with the indisputable observation that kayaking, along with the entire outdoor sports industry, is overwhelmingly white.” The IR leaders noted that step one in reversing the trend would be to “simply work on the tangible aspects of making outdoor recreation more accessible to people of color.”
These words were a call to action for Durkee and Toscano.
“It served as a catalyst,” said Durkee. “I realized that there was going to be industry support for work like this.”
Toscano said that while several companies in the outdoor industry were interested in addressing the lack of BIPOC participation in paddling, those good intentions hadn’t yet been successfully harnessed and directed.
Through interviews with outdoor industry leaders conducted for a project for Culturs, a global multicultural magazine for which Toscano is a regular contributor, she realized that the industry had been wrestling with this phenomenon for at least a decade—without making much progress.
“Everyone said that they needed to bring more people of color into the sport, but no one really knew how to tackle it,” Toscano said. “They don’t know what they should or can do to diversify the sport. And I thought, well, that’s pretty unfortunate because for months, groups like Diversify Whitewater, CityWILD, Outdoor Afro, Vibe Tribe Adventures, The Unpopular Black, and Melanin Base Camp have been working to diversify all adventure sports. But people who are central to this industry, and are very well known within the industry, don’t know we exist.”
Although several organizations encourage participation by BIPOC in adventure sports, Diversify Whitewater is one of the few that focuses on whitewater boating.
The first event Diversify Whitewater initiated, with help from other organizations, including Team River Runner, was a paddling trip on the Cache la Poudre river in July 2020 that drew 37 first-time paddlers. Diversify Whitewater followed that up with a skills training day at Boyd Lake in Loveland, Colorado, in September 2020.
Toscano said that one factor that inhibits industry leaders from taking initiative is concern that their efforts will do more to draw attention to their own companies than to further the goal of diversifying adventure sports.
The result of that reticence, Toscano said, is that “a lot of people don’t know about all of the wonderful work that organizations like Diversify Whitewater, in partnership with the outdoor adventure industry, have been doing under the radar.”
Toscano said she understands that it can be uncomfortable at first to figure out how to approach expanding opportunities for BIPOC if you’re not of that culture.
“It’s hard to know the most respectful, the most productive, way to bring another culture into something new,” she said. “I understand why it’s difficult.”
Sharing the river-running experience
Setting aside the problem-solving approach and simply sharing the transformative experience of paddling can be a good first step to breaking down those cultural barriers.
“I just want more people who look like me and have shared interests to experience this,” said Toscano. “So it’s more of a goal to share the wealth instead of treating it like a problem that we have to tackle.”
Durkee said that bringing together people from different backgrounds and hearing their stories brings meaning to the work they’re doing with Diversify Whitewater.
“We’re sharing a beautiful sport instead of trying to solve the industry’s problems,” she said. “At our events, we were bringing together not just one or two but 30 or 80 people who all look different. We all look unique and are from different backgrounds and we all share this experience—and it is really beautiful.”
Passing along paddling skills
After two successful events in 2020, Durkee and Toscano plan to organize more local events and provide program assistance this year to other groups across the country who want to host similar events in their areas.
The focus for 2021 will be not just taking BIPOC on river trips but also teaching newcomers paddling skills so they can continue to explore rivers, lakes, and other waterways—and pass along that knowledge to others.
“We definitely heard from the adventure sports groups we work with that they don’t want to just be taken on a raft trip,” said Toscano. “They want to learn how to go paddle on their own.”
And as these new paddlers invite others to join them, the whitewater boating community will expand to encompass people of all backgrounds, connected by the love of paddling.
Toscano said that was the vibe she picked up when she first started paddling in Colorado.
“I didn’t feel like I was being questioned because I was a person of color paddling,” she said. “It was more like, ‘Oh, you’re a kayaker? I want to be your bestie!’ “
Want to expand your circle of paddling buddies or support Diversity Whitewater initiatives? Follow Diversify Whitewater on Instagram.
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