C-Forum

Larry Horne wrote:that looked like an air brace to me

Really? Then I might not have the right vocabulary...

At 0:13 here that is an air brace to me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHr8zO7FIdg

Remember? Using air humidity, etc... On a rainy day I am sure the falling stuff on your paddle could even help too getting some push

Eddyhops: great pictures for sure!

I had a nice righting pry at Triple Drop the last time I ran Wilson Creek. I see a fair number of righting prys from righties who run the race line at Nantahala Falls.

ummmm...

if the off side brace is so elusive, what do you do when you are side surfing a hole (intentionally or un intentionally) on your off side what do you use?

If you don't have an off side high brace this is a good way to practice.
On side side surfing is also a good time to develop the righting pry as well, let the water get a little of your edge the correct with a pry.

Wood

There was a good thread on the (onside) upstream brace for side surfing a while ago. It definitely requires a pourover that is not too steep, and you have to feather the blade to keep it up on top of the water, but since that thread, I've tried it a few times, and it works!

marclamenace wrote:

Larry Horne wrote:that looked like an air brace to me

Really? Then I might not have the right vocabulary...

At 0:13 here that is an air brace to me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHr8zO7FIdg

yep that's a classic air brace in the second clip for sure.

In the first clip- you're right. not a classic air brace... he was sly..he followed up the air brace with a little grab of water of some sort, It looked to me like a draw though, not a pry. whatever it was, it worked!

A rightening pry is a reflex-thing, you don't have the time to think about it. I know of using it once. And I only knew when someone looking at my line was telling me afterwards: I was thinking you were tipping over and then did some "magic" and stayed upright.
Of course I tipped over way more times then I saved my butt

For the offside high brace/surf, I really like those really really small pour-overs. Just enough to hold your boat. There you need really good boat tilt to stay in, and you can learn to work your blade on the offside. I was terrible in it 2 years ago, and I ended up last year doing 360's in a hole where I ended up unwanted and this year doing deliberate 360's (all small features though, nothing really impressive).

Since I tend to paddle most on my left, but roll on my right, my solution to some offside flips is to quickly switch hands after it's truly lost, and get the blade down for a low brace (or more often a roll back up) on my offside-cum-onside. No problem. It happened like that this passed Sunday, and I thought of this thread.

Pat.

p.s. The video of the offside rolls and hand rolls is depressing! I hate to be defeatist, but I just don't think that level is happening for me!

OK, so I am resurrecting this fascinating thread in response to this spotting of an actual off-side low brace:

marclamenace wrote:

FullGnarlzOC wrote:did you guys across the pond figure out how to offside brace or somethin

Just to jump on your auto-hijack here , there was an interesting (to me) discussion around offside braces sometime ago where we were chatting around a video from esprit showing Jim Coffey low bracing offside landing a drop and today I also catched one of these rather rarely seen move on Jordan's Quebec creek'n clip.

@ 2:42 right here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGGZF5Nj0wg

Wish I can throw something like that one day...

And I also noticed a failed attempt in the latest "You're Going to Run That in a Canoe" video. This clip is probably a little more like how it will look when the mortals among us try this maneuver out. It smacks of a journeyman's off-side flail/lowbrace attempt @ 1:50.

Video here: http://youtu.be/I1ReP-v1jbo

Does anyone have any critique about how this fella's valiant effort might be improved upon? Did he have any chance of righting his craft? Is he going for the offside roll??!?

The "Your going to..." guy was doomed before he had his paddle out of the water on the onside. That is to say, his boat healed to, and landed on, the off side going over the ledge. Whereas, the other guy more or less landed flat and started toward the off side as he resurfaced. IOW, he had a less drastic situation that developed later and perhaps bit more slowly. Still preternaturally flexible and quick to react though. I could have done that... forty years ago.... maybe.