Three months after the opening of the 2023 Canoe Sprint World Cup, excitement is building ahead of the Olympic and Paralympic qualification campaign, just two years after the Tokyo Games closed. The 2023 kayaking and canoeing season, paracanoe, will begin in the spiritual homeland of this sport in the city of Szeged (Hungary). Crowds of spectators will cheer on athletes from all over the world at the opening of the World Cup in kayaking and canoeing and paracanoe. The rowers begin their journey that will take them to Paris in 2024. The main road to the Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games runs through the ICF World Championships in Duisburg (Germany), which will be held in June. This is an opportunity for athletes to earn quotas for Paris 2024 for their country. The Szeged World Cup and the second World Cup in Poznan (Poland) will provide athletes with a valuable opportunity to check their progress before the Paris qualification tournaments. It will also provide teams with a valuable opportunity to experiment with different athletes on their boats. There will be new competitions in Paris. The men's K2 and C2 1000-meter races become 500-meter events, and the men's and women's K1 200-meter races are no longer included in the program. Szeged will also provide an opportunity to show about the latest Paralympic paracanoe competitions. The women's VL3 has been added to the program of the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris, which will give paracanoe 10 medals. Szeged has earned a reputation as one of the best places for kayaking and canoeing in the world. The city has hosted four ICF World Championships, the first of which was held in 1998, and also regularly hosts World Cups and World Championships among juniors and under-23s. From 11 to 14 May, the first stage of the Rowing and Canoeing and Paracanoe World Cup will be held in Szeged.