C-Forum

am i doing it right? http://youtu.be/S5tCfHXzGHU?list=UUt3C8 ... EY7irMazrw" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

There were strokes? I thought you were just letting it run, minimalist style?

Looked a bit tough on the gunwale and paddle shaft, a lot of prying and ruddering?

Seriously, the slo-mo really screwed my brain up, it gives an impression you were hardly paddling at all, but the way you negotiate the obstacles you must have been!

I didn't watch the video, but if you want ideas how to paddle your canoe better, check out "Path of the Paddle" by Bill Mason:

http://youtu.be/YqvSOtgg6no

He used a lot of draws and scull to maneuver and slide the canoe around where he wanted it.

I admire anyone searching for better paddling. So here goes. Pardon my brutality. it all IMHO

Its all about boat control. Proper Habits of correct body position and paddle techniques
increase control exponentially.

Your choked up on the paddle to much. Widen your grip and lean forward more.
You dip/lean to your the onside with your forward stroke. Don't do that .
How about a cross stroke/ bow draw/ etc. Steer with the bow more not just
stern sweep/draw all the time.
Time your strokes so that when you hit a wave you reach across to the backside
of the wave and pull your self through. That is a lot more stable.
Steer when your on top of waves, etc. not in the trough.
Behind your waist is the last place you want to try to
control your canoe, except in a ferry.
Develop your technique to keep everything in front of your waist , leaning forward ,as
much as possible. And use cross strokes much more.

That's why great boaters ( not claiming I'm one ) like fast edgy canoes. The boat responds to
things mentioned above. Applying canoe Slalom principles will serve you well in creeks.

And use the force, it seems to help,
Cheers

Not bad C5 !
What is sad is most of the points you make I already know but lazily modify to ineffectiveness.
And then start over. And then....again.
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Einar, it was interesting seeing all the photos Linda took at our little T50 slalom race... I'd hope to see myself leaning forward, paddling upfront, on the offside, etc., but somehow most photos seemed to catch me in some form of ruddering!

Like many of us, I know the theory, but the old, bad habits are way too hard to break (especially as a has-been who seldom paddles, I think the only way to a new & improved style is to actually go out and train with some purpose).

We should go to the slalom course with some rotten tomatoes and take turns pelting each other when we fall back into lazy stern corrections!!

Pat.

I always got my fingers whacked with a ruler . The tomatoes thing doesn't sound bad.

Hey Harry, do you use a cleated painter?

thanks class5 i now see how bad i am. i think that when i learned my offside stroke my balance was not so sure always ready for a brace. so i have a bad habit of staying onside for everything.yes rand c1 i do use jam cleats for fore and aft painters,handy when swimming with my canoe. i do tend to go for a ride in my canoe rather than captain her.

You are obviously doing something right because it looks like quite a big rapid and you got down just fine!

There are different approaches - conservative/defensive like yours, and most people tripping with lots of gear in a long boat, or explosive/offensive they way short boaters paddle.

Sometimes a low energy defensive approach may be best for the situation, but there are disadvantages which a more aggressive aproach can get round. One is that you are moving more or less at the speed of the river and committed to the middle of the wave trains, which makes it quite hard to hit a an eddy mid-rapid if you decide you want to, and means you go up and down a lot which can obscure your view downstream, get quite splashy and wet, and sometimes leave you unstable for a moment on the peak of a wave.

My preference, usually, is to work down a rapid using a number of diagonal lines with power applied in bursts to move from line to line. Instead of letting the boat run downstream from the entry point, I will usually be paddling hard towards one or other shoulder of the first wave, diagonally accross the tongue aiming to vector such that I hit a sweet spot on the shoulder between the peak and the eddy line so that I stay in the fast water (of can punch through into the eddy if I haven't spotted the line for the next stage already) but don't hit the bottom of the trough or the peak of the wave. When I hit the shoulder I will be turning the boat, either straight down the shoulder line if it is all clear on the same side, or if that side is blocked and the other clear through 90 degrees or more so I can start a diagonal cut accross to the opposite shoulder on the next wave, depending on how close together they are - getting it wrong and hitting the peak of a breaker sideways usually sucks!

I have pauses to time strokes, I use sweeps and draws and pries and rudders and sometimes do 4 or 5 cross deck strokes in a row (they usually get less and less effective the more you do!) before working out I'm wasting my time and need to do something onside, but the idea is to keep the boat moving and keep it on the flatter water at the edges of the features giving me the best possible view ahead so I can work out where I want to put the boat and still have time to get it there.

Of course it doesn't always work out, and as any trad boater will tell you, hitting a wave peak full on at speed can get you a good swamping. I also have a habit of committing too much edge to breaking out (I've paddled kayak playboat for far too long!) and dipping the gunwale under so I'm definitely not someone to copy too closely!

Like I say - 'USUALLY', every situation is different and sometimes I do just sit back and let it run.....

As for your actual strokes, I was too mesmerised to really pay them much attention - a few times I could see about a third of your blade above the water level though, may have been due to reach as the water dropped or the boat rolled, but generally speaking you want to use the whole area of the blade, not just the bottom 2/3

Hey, here is a clip of me using all the stuff I talk about above - not very well, it's only my 6th day of paddling OC1 properly and you will spot that as I change direction later on I disappear sideways into a breaker, but I did dodge all the big holes and even made the eddy on the right not long afterwards, although swamped and with little control left!

I've sped up his run to almost real-time:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Juz9d5u ... e=youtu.be" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

JimW wrote:a few times I could see about a third of your blade above the water level though, may have been due to reach as the water dropped or the boat rolled, but generally speaking you want to use the whole area of the blade, not just the bottom 2/3

On re-watching Bobs sped up version, I completely retract this comment!
All you forward power strokes and the sculling draw phase have the blade completely immersed, goodness knows what I was seeing before!

After the initial acceleration phase, for latter forward paddling phases it looks like your catch is quite a way out to the side and then slices in close to the boat right away, but the blade angle doesn't seem to suggest you are doing bow draws or C strokes? Nervous and reaching wide for support?

I, m agree with all experts above. But gopro wide angle frown significantly changes the perspective. So it,s difficult to see the true motions

new sony AS-15 HD action camera

There should be, must be, some forward lean, but it is possible to overdo it. A boat is designed for a certain weight distribution for speed and for spinning or carving. Just as leaning too far back can make it harder to control the hull optimally, leaning forward too much of the time or to an excessive degree can work against the hull design.

Today in slalom c-1s we have mainly somewhat cab-forward designs, and I suggest that too much forward lean is not the way to paddle these boats.

On the other hand, in my fishform Millbrook OC-1, I learned that the seat position should be a bit back, and that forward lean can be used more liberally to reach forward and steer the fatter bow where I want it to go.