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The clothing of a canoe sailor should protect from sunshine, cold wind and rain, spray and complete exposure. It is easier to spot a sailing canoe than a canoe, so the colour of the canoe or clothing is an issue only when the rig is taken down.
Solar radiation
Protection from sunshine is important and is best accomplished by proper clothing. Shoulders, neck and arms are protected by a shirt and brimmed hat, that also protects face, ears and nose. Because of dispersion not more than half of the total ultraviolet radiation comes from the direction of the sun. Most of it comes from every other direction and in a shadow can amount half of the total UV-radiation. Therefore it is necessary to protect oneself even on a cloudy day.
On water eyes are worth protecting by sunglasses and even more if children are involved. It is recommended to use sunglasses that protect also from side radiation. Excess UV-radiation causes acute cornea infection in the unprotected eye with simpletons of strong pain and feel of foreign object in the eye (snow blindness). Symptoms usually appear after few hours exposure and disappear after couple of days.
The material of the clothing is usually not important, dark colours give better UV-protection than lighter ones. Even the lightest cotton shirt drops the UV level down to10%. A loose cloth gives better protection than a tight one. A wet fabric loses some of its UV-protection since water carries UV-rays.
Cold wind and water
On the other hand cold cotton on skin causes significant loss of body heat. Hypothermia can be prevented by layered clothing. A polypropylene underwear conducts water off the skin into the insulating layer and a breathing wind protection layer hinders airflow near the skin. A woollen cap protects the head even when wet.
In cold conditions it is necessary to wear a safety suit (dry suit). Its principal purpose is to keep the user dry when immersed in the cold water. Because water cools you down 25 times faster than air of the same temperature, the danger of hypothermia is imminent after few minutes immersion in worst cases. Only when temperature reaches 17-18 degrees centigrade or higher there is a change of surviving several hours exposure without becoming hypothermia. So considering the Finnish summer there are only few moments when immersion protection is not necessary. The dry suit keeps the user dry by watertight seams, zippers and seals on wrists and neck. When no water can make it way inside the suit, the air left in the suit and inside clothing insulates the user from the cold water. Even some advertisements call ordinary flotation overalls as safety suits, they don't work well as safety suits, since when immersed the water flows in and changes through wrists and ankles, rapidly cooling the user. In cold water a flotation overall is better than nothing but the same insulation and buoyancy can be achieved by wearing a fur overall and using a normal PFD.
When using a safety suit is important that the air inside is not packed in feet but in the upper body. In worst case the safety suit user is not able to surface his head to breath but remains floating upside down. A canoe sailor can avoid this by wearing shorts or trousers on the safety suit, so the excess air cannot be trapped in feet.
Doing one's natural needs might be problematic with a safety suit on.
 In picture excellent suit for to protect from cold water at high capsize risk. The IC-class canoe sailor has to maintain moveability and protect himself from bruises.
An example of a proper sailing clothing
In canoe sailing the proper clothing means clothing according to water temperature. So not only clothing for the weather and air:
- A right size PFD to support the weight of the sailor. For youngsters a collar model supporting the neck is recommended
- Wind tight, rapidly drying suit (take heed of a possible rain, constant spray and capsize situation)
- In spring and autumn sailing a dry suit or at least a wetsuit is a must. In summer there might be a change to do without
- Neoprene gloves in cold conditions
- Sunglasses and a good hat ( a cap, brimmed hat with a jaw line or a tight baseball cap) and suncream
- Spare clothing packed waterproof.
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