C-Forum

I'm here at ASCI and as PAC mentioned the conveyor belt is up and running. A very nice ride! Normally the water flow here for daily paddling and rafting is at either 2 pumps (Class II-III) or 3 pumps (Class III-IV). They are training and running Nationals at 3-1/2 pumps. It makes it very very pushy! Most of the US Junior and Senior Teams are now here training and its awesome to watch.

Pictures can be found at http://picasaweb.google.com/ndtspwt/USNationals2007

I will update with more photos as time allows but I'm using a wireless network and uploads are slow. After I return home I will update that web album with lots more photos.

Natalie

WOW! Looks like a great time.

Anyone else thinking next year's Armada might have to drop in there

Adam I agree - it would be a great place for an Armada stop. We almost stopped there this year but they were not quite up and running and well folks wanted to paddle.

On another note Natalie has posted on the local club pages some updates and I thought I'd reposted them here for folks as well. Enjoy and if she posts more I'll try to copy them over. Paul C.

Day 2 from Nationals week.
Okay so I squeezed my bruised hip into the boat and participated in the morning practice. 3-1/2 pumps is quite different from 3 pumps. The difficulty increases and the top of the course is a mess of squirrely currents that fluctuate. You have to keep your boat moving at all times. No lazy paddling here. Practice went okay but I need much improvement before Saturday. (Youth is wasted on the young) I'm slowly getting used to the new boat although I still forget that I need to lean forward more. For me getting back endered somewhere in each run is getting to be the norm. Today I stalled just enough in a small hole and the water caught the back edge behind me, and well-a a lovely back ender for the spectators. Glad they enjoyed it. The hard part is controlling the landing in the bizarre currents.

Oh and the highlight of the morning was riding the conveyor belt. Wee!

Here's a few pics from the day yesterday, more to follow.

http://picasaweb.google.com/ndtspwt/USNationals2007

Natalie

http://picasaweb.google.com/ndtspwt/USNationals2007

Day 3 from ASCI.
Practice is going okay, I've spent most of the morning paddling and am now taking a break in the shade before the evening practice session. Most of the competitors have arrived and its been great catching up and chatting with them. Gold medalist Joe Jacobi (C2 '92 Olympics) is here coaching my buddies Rick Powell and Casey Eichfeld from PA. I've know Casey and Rick since they started racing about the age of 6. They are awesome paddlers and at the age of 17 and 18 they made both the US Junior and Senior Teams this year in C2. They have just returned from Europe where they had a wonderful experience racing in World Cups races and Junior Pre-Worlds. Later this fall they will be traveling to Brazil to race in the World Championships. A couple of new photos of Rick and Casey can be found at http://picasaweb.google.com/ndtspwt/USNationals2007

I also met the Iranian womens team who are here learning and training this summer. They came to learn/train here and race at Nationals for upper level race experience. Their program is accelerated and the pressure is on them as the 3 of them are teenagers and working hard to improve their skills. Their goal is to respresent Iran at the Olympics next year. This is the first effort to field a women's team in Iran.

That's all for now,

Natalie

http://picasaweb.google.com/ndtspwt/USNationals2007

adamin wrote:Anyone else thinking next year's Armada might have to drop in there

Excellent idea I think I read a while back on the Angst board that there's a mystery spot Those who aren't lured by the realm of the underworld can play on the surface. Something for everyone

Day 4
A long day today, didn't actually make it on the water until the evening session. Generally the coaches that are here, club coaches and US Jr and Sr Team coaches set the practice gates and those of us without coaches just sort of follow along. The moves are getting harder and it has definitely set apart the elite paddlers from the rest of us. I definitely struggled with some of the moves in the pushy water. After dealing this morning with a bit of stomach upset due to greasey bar food from last night, the majority of my day was spent assisting in getting the software for the scoreboard that arrived yesterday to talk to the computers. We ran into several hardware glitches that took some lengthy troubleshooting to resolve. A few parts will arrive tomorrow and we're hoping that all will be well.

Tomorrow morning is the last practice session prior to the race on Sat. so it will be full. More competitors arrived today to get used to the new course. So far the overall impression of the ASCI channel has been a rating of pretty good to great from most of the competitors that I've talked to. They all like the 3-1/2 pump level.

Currently there are 3 Olympians present and at least one more to arrive tomorrow. 3 of the 4 are C1 paddlers. Tomorrow evening is an Alumni gathering so alot of the past US Team members and national champions will be present and it should be fun.

No photos today but will try to post some tomorrow.

All for now as the practices sessions start at 7:00am and its now midnight,

Natalie

it's weird training for an evening race... runs start at 3 and are supposed to be over at 8... training here at night is funky because it gets dark so quickly. but the water is fun, more natural feeling than charlotte, and has way more options. so much more variability here than in charlotte. well, they are probably about equal, but charlotte will no longer use midstream features because their raft guides can't figure out how to get around them...
the conveyor here is long, ungodly long. it's like 2:23, charlotte with a longer track is 58 seconds... it's great for Loops though!!! :D
cheers
-isaac

Had great fun watching the Nationals on Saturday with the kids. We didn't get a chance to try out the water, which might be a good thing as it looked pushy enough at 3-1/2 pumps that I probably would have been debris.

On Sunday I dropped the kids off at Riversport in Confluence for a week of paddling camp. Looking forward to returning next week for a family week in Ohiopyle.

John

Yes, nice to see everyone and meet you, Nathan and Isaac. I must say, Wisp is definitely easier (to me) than Charlotte or Dickerson. I had a couple of nice flips while training, but mostly it was pretty laid-back -- whereas at Charlotte I felt like I was getting thrown around every training session, and about the least violent course encounters I had were during the race!

Most of the eddies at Wisp felt nice and friendly, very river-like in fact, at least compared to those "things" at Dickerson that are called eddies.

That race had about the easiest ups on any course in a major race I've done for some time, in fact. The only problem . . . was the downstreams . . . !

Alden

Yes, Matt Taylor seems to like dive gates followed by nasty offsets. I saw one of those combinations bite Casey & Rick on their second C-2 run. They unsuccessfully tried to pivot in the eddy after diving through 16 to turn for 17; when the pivot stalled they switched to a back ferry only to have the pole bounce the wrong way around Rick's helmet for a 50.

John

I enjoyed the offsets and the gates set to use boils to push people off line right after an upstream (gate 6 and 14 I think).

That flush/upstream gate 10 was the decider for the top C-1 placing I was sitt there for both runs of Frakker and Amoson and the time difference between the two boats was the difference at the end of the race.

Here are the last 3 c-1s in gate 10 on 2nd runs

[img]http://lh5.google.com/WesternmdDem/RrX- ... 0_3004.jpg[/img]

[img]http://lh5.google.com/WesternmdDem/RrX- ... 0_3006.jpg[/img]

[img]http://lh3.google.com/WesternmdDem/RrX- ... 0_3008.jpg[/img]



BTW We will have that same water level when we run our Giant Slalom next Friday Night. (GS is 10-11 gates over almost full length course).

Nathan

That eddy was very dynamic. The first picture shows Eric coming in off the drop. He was aiming for the little area of stability that the gate was sitting atop of. He missed the line and hit the "green water" rushing back upstream. You can see by his angle that he went into an instant ferry across that upstream water and could not get things back under control until he completely crossed it. Ben in frame 3 hits the area of stabilty perfectly and does not get surfed across the eddy. At least a 7-9 second difference right there.

A more general observation I saw was that slowing yourself down off that drop really seemed to require a lot of strength. The women in particular all struggled with it.

I did not get to watch the 7, 8, and 9 offsett. However, they looked pretty tough as well.

[img]http://lh6.google.com/WesternmdDem/RrX3 ... 0_2909.jpg[/img]

[img]http://lh6.google.com/WesternmdDem/RrX3 ... 0_2909.jpg[/img]

[img]http://lh4.google.com/WesternmdDem/RrX3 ... 0_2911.jpg[/img]

You can see one of the poles from gate 9 on the left edge of the first pic. It was the 7 to 8 part that was toughest.

Also, Sylvan Poberaj set the course. He seems to like aggresive offsets.

yeah Sylvan set an interesting course, I struggled with parts of it. the offset from 7-8 works much better with a higher pool there where you cfreate a wave a little farther back, and can surf really well from 7 to 8, this one was an interesting pause and then jump. it was really hard after my knee block fell out in my second run...
cheers
-isaac

Very interesting pictures, Nathan. You must be a fan of slalom or something.

I didn't even try the thing that Benn and Erik are pictured doing -- I did the traditional up. I thought I went pretty fast on the second run, but still -- Benn did that gate like a down and never lost momentum. I just didn't think I could make that move. Still don't. I saw Austin do the traditional up on at least his first run, and I seem to recall his time was 106? So somewhat close to Benn, at least.

Anyway, I've got to hand it Silvan -- that was a great, great idea to give everyone a choice like that.

I thought 7 and 8 were pretty easy -- definitely required staying flat when you first hit the pourover (as opposed to leaning right).

Yes, I really had a hard time with those gates you mentioned, John, where Rick and Casey 50'd. I just couldn't make the move well between from 15, 16, and 17. The boil was kicking away from 17 -- very challenging and humbling.

I'm looking forward to seeing some video from the race at some point.

Alden