2022 | June | Floating work of art!

In the second week of June, the time had come again: Students of the University of Kassel were finally allowed to present their concrete canoe at the 18th Concrete Canoe Regatta in Brandenburg an der Havel. The regatta takes place every two years and is not only a sporting competition, but also a concrete technology challenge for the participants.

The special feature this year was a polygonal formwork concept that allowed the use of recyclable formwork panels. The admittedly not fully streamlined vehicle was allowed to compete against teams from educational institutions in several countries, including Austria, Hungary and Turkey.

A team of 6 students from the University of Kassel designed and built a formwork that could be filled several times with a fiber-reinforced lightweight concrete based on UHPC. The result of each concreting was a canoe half, two of which could be bolted together to form a complete canoe. The wall thickness was only 1.5 cm. With the motto "Is this art or does it really float?" a floating curiosity was to take part in the race in honor of this year's documenta. Due to its polygonal shape, an upright canoe half resembles an obelisk. This inspired the students to "incorporate" the biblical lettering from our 2017 Kassel "Original" by Olu Oguibe into the watercraft as well. By merging an obelisk with a canoe, the name was created: "Kanulisk".

On an extremely sunny Thursday, the Kassel team arrived to set up the presentation stand and accommodations. The following day the canoe was presented to the public and the jury. Finally, on Saturday, the race was contested by a men's team. Despite the streamlined design, the University of Kassel was able to keep up with the 3 slowest in terms of time! The evenings between the events were used for professional exchange between the students of the different teams, there was also live music and an entertaining evaluation of the team shirts. We congratulate our Kassel students on the successful expedition on new terrain and look forward to the next regatta!

More information about the concrete canoe regatta: https://www.beton.org/inspiration/betonkanu-regatta/

Impressions of the 18th concrete canoe regatta in Brandenburg an der Havel: https://www.picdrop.com/izb/2022