The Waterfall Rudder

[skeptical in seattle]

OK, I've got a move for you all to try!!

We were talking before about offside boofs, but I have a move that is absolutely AWESOMER than that. It is the Waterfall Rudder.

I grew up (or in a boating sense) in a town with only one rapid - a 20 foot waterfall. We did it all the time. We used to run it instead of eating meals. Anyway, it often happens while boofing that your bow gets kicked to one side. If you boof on the right like I do, then you will likely land facing a little bit left a lot. It always irked me that kayakers could avoid this. They would take a boof stroke at the lip, and then take ANOTHER stroke on the other side in the curtain, as they were falling. This used to bother me that I couldn't do that . . .

Until I started doing The Waterfall Rudder!

Basically this entails taking a boof stroke and starting to fall. As your bow starts to drift away, you reach back into the curtain and do a rudder/correction stroke to turn the bow back to the onside. It is REALLY cool! I have only done it a few times, but it is really neat.

I am now considering the next step - The Waterfall J-Sroke . . .

Alden

[Paddle Power]

Impressive. Us single blade paddlers need to keep up this kind of thinking, "what works for us?"

[Jan_dettmer]

Yeah, that is an issue. I try to not boof stuff in the 20 foot range though thats pretty dam tall. I try to account for the angle in the approach.
Anyways, controlling a C1 in the free fall seems to be harder than a Kayak.

What do you do if you, for instance, have to boof off a pillow (sloping water) towards your off-side.
On my off-side, I really lean into the turn, like riding a bike, to reach for the water.
On my off side I have no idea. Its pretty hard and I get trashed that way sometimes.

That situation is quite common, especially in u shaped falls where you want to boof off of the sloping water on one side...

Cheers, Jan

[CosmikDebris]

Last time I ran Gorilla on the green I boofed and almost landed on my head. There is a seam on the launch pad at certain levels, and when I boof I tend to drop a little right edge to counteract that left veer you were describing. Anyways, that's not the best drop to drop any edge on and the seam caught my right stern edge and tried to flip me as I boofed. I started flipping, then threw my body so that my boat was under me but I was falling sideways, then threw it again so my boat straightened out. Hard to describe but it was kind of a waterfall rudder because I was basically using a rudder stroke to throw my boat around. It was a little scary, and everyone that saw it says my boat was in like 5 different directions going off the drop. It's amazing how much you can move your boat around in mid-air. I think you can do it a lot more in a C1 because there is more hip mobility/leverage...just like aerial moves in a playboat.
I'll have to keep that waterfall rudder concept in mind though, that's a cool idea. There's nothign worse than landing and veering quickly to one side and then getting WORKED!

[Jim Michaud]

Sounds like a nice technique, Alden. I'll give it a try on that neat little thirteen footer on Roaring Brook before trying it on taller stuff.

Jim