"OC1 is a joke"

RapidMediaTVGuy · Post by **RapidMediaTVGuy** » Wed Jun 29, 2011 5:14 pm

You mean right after the WW Grand PRix and worlds? I'd say it's a great time to talk about it! Some interesting points discussed around the web as well. Most folks I've talked to think the WW Grand PRix is great for the sport. I'm still on the fence. It's great that it got so much exposure but I'm worried it might turn off people who don't know that you can have fun and be safe on the easier stuff.

Dan Caldwell
Rapid Media TV Guy

Craig Smerda · Post by **Craig Smerda** » Wed Jun 29, 2011 6:32 pm

RapidMediaTVGuy wrote:Some interesting points discussed around the web as well.

Hey Josh... where did this initial dialogue take place? The stuff on the T>R's page is copied from another thread. I'd like to see the original in it's entirety. Post or PM me a link...

I'd like to see where and why "Andrew Pollock-- OC1 is a joke..." was initially posted because I just love a good "discussion"???

insolence · Post by **insolence** » Sat Jul 09, 2011 11:23 pm

it's not only on the freestyle competitions, but on the rivers, too that people think " OC1 is a joke" - especially in my home area where you can be considered either mad or stupid showing up in OC on serious whitewater as happened to one of the best single blade paddlers alive.. or even "C1 is a joke" and even better "woman in C1 is a joke" as it had been the case on the slalom courses for a long time

i cannot understand why the "haters" just cannot let everyone have their fun, and this too encourages me to get better and better and one day show them how totally wrong they all are

FullGnarlzOC · Post by **FullGnarlzOC** » Sun Jul 10, 2011 12:49 am

my grandma can kayak.

RVDriver · Post by **RVDriver** » Tue Jul 12, 2011 5:45 pm

OC1 a joke? Not to me, thogh it does provide some laughs. I paddled kayak for a long time, got a little bored and then saw J-Dawg trying out for the US team in 07 and thought "THAT looks like a blast!". Been C boating exclusivley for the past 2 years now, river-running in a Paradigm, playboating in first an Orbit Fish and now a Project X 56, competing in OC1 "freestyle" in a Blackfly and having a blast in all of it. Has renewed my love for whitewater which was admittedly waning when I met my wife. Ran the lower Gauley last year at Gauley fest, most of the Beaver in NY and am on the Dryway in one of my three C boats as often as possible, also love to hit the Fife Brook and hone my skills on the eddylines down there when the Dryway shuts off. Would like to one day Open Boat the Grand Canyon, something that for whatever reason doesn't interest me overly in a kayak, much like playboating. I'm not a big creek boater but feel much more compelled to try creeking in an open boat than in a kayak as well. Strange phenomenon. Thrill of something new I suppose.

Anyway, rambling now but just wanted to throw a thumbs up at OC1 in all of it's manifestations.

Jeff

philcanoe · Post by **philcanoe** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 9:43 am

Yes, it is... 2 me

...and it use to be just fun. Now it's kinda funny to insist open canoe freestyle even exist any longer. As a former team member I gave up the sport not because I couldn't do it, or was no longer (at least moderately) competitive, but instead because too many deck boaters started taking the top of their boats and calling them open canoes. If they wanted to compete fair and square in a real canoe, then it would have been different.

I have never entered any 'freestyle competition' (other than against kayaks) in my Spanish Fly for this reason. And even took a second place on that occasion. In fact I have never really been insistent on calling it a canoe. Usually when asked, my response is to call it a hybrid design. And yes, I do wish it had higher ends like a real canoe.

And from what I saw on video this year...

the sport has just gotten farther removed from my idea of a open canoe. Yes, there were a few that I'd call OC1's, but the majority appeared to be something more akin to Sit-on-Tops or Skirt-less C1's.

Craig Smerda · Post by **Craig Smerda** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 5:04 pm

but Phil... a 'traditional OC1' (ends equal to or higher than the middle) is probably going to do about 3-4 things... ender, piroutte, spin and maybe do ?~something~? else... but it usually takes a pretty darn big feature to pull off a unique move in a canoe like that. frankly I'd get bored pretty easily trying to do 'rodeo' moves in my traditional OC around these parts... sure... spins and enders can be fun... but for how long... eh I duuno'???

the great thing about the Fly's and everything that's come after them CUFly, Salsa, BlackFly, etc. is that a paddler could go out and have fun and do more moves with more variety on smaller features that most people have on most rivers near them... no big holes required... still fun.

my only real gripe (not that I compete any longer so my opinion really shouldn't matter) is that yes... there were a handfull of kayaks "converted" to fit the rules of the "open canoe" class. most of them looked ridiculous and frankly they hurt my eyeballs.

there are people working to make sure that if people continue to choose to go this route... they at the very least adhere to the tradition of paddling a truly "open" boat. I don't care for the K1 conversions... but who am I to complain too loudly if I don't compete any longer?

davel · Post by **davel** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 6:46 pm

Does the OC-1 class have a significant difference from the C-1 class with the current rules? That's basically the question that would decide if it should exist separate or be merged. As of now, I don't see a huge difference especially considering the popularity of converted kayak hulls.

Just from the outside perspective, never had an opportunity to paddle a fly or freestyle boat. But from the outside, the two freestyle disciplines seem to be converging.

Craig Smerda · Post by **Craig Smerda** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 8:41 pm

davel wrote:Does the OC-1 class have a significant difference from the C-1 class with the current rules?

yes... and that's the way it should continue to be.

hankrankin · Post by **hankrankin** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 11:14 pm

FullGnarlzOC wrote:my grandma can kayak.

philcanoe · Post by **philcanoe** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 11:17 pm

Craig Smerda wrote:
davel wrote:Does the OC-1 class have a significant difference from the C-1 class with the current rules?
yes... and that's the way it should continue to be.

Appears a spray skirt - is that much difference?

can you post boat specs ?

Craig Smerda · Post by **Craig Smerda** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 11:25 pm

philcanoe wrote:
Craig Smerda wrote:
davel wrote:Does the OC-1 class have a significant difference from the C-1 class with the current rules?
yes... and that's the way it should continue to be.
Appears a spray skirt - is that much difference?

can you post boat specs ?

chat with Jeremy & Eli about it if you'd like Phil... they are pretty much heading up the conversations with the ICF competition committee about this topic from the American P.O.V. I've been copied on the emails and from my perspective all of the people involved from around the globe have a firm grip about what an open canoe "is" and what it "isn't". it appears that we're in capable hands from my comfy seat in the balcony.

philcanoe · Post by **philcanoe** » Thu Jul 14, 2011 11:33 pm

Craig Smerda wrote:but Phil... a 'traditional OC1' (ends equal to or higher than the middle) is probably going to do about 3-4 things... ender, piroutte, spin and maybe do ?~something~? else... but it usually takes a pretty darn big feature to pull off a unique move in a canoe like that. frankly I'd get bored pretty easily trying to do 'rodeo' moves in my traditional OC around these parts... sure... spins and enders can be fun... but for how long... eh I duuno'???

the great thing about the Fly's and everything that's come after them CUFly, Salsa, BlackFly, etc. is that a paddler could go out and have fun and do more moves with more variety on smaller features that most people have on most rivers near them... no big holes required... still fun.

my only real gripe (not that I compete any longer so my opinion really shouldn't matter) is that yes... there were a handfull of kayaks "converted" to fit the rules of the "open canoe" class. most of them looked ridiculous and frankly they hurt my eyeballs.

there are people working to make sure that if people continue to choose to go this route... they at the very least adhere to the tradition of paddling a truly "open" boat. I don't care for the K1 conversions... but who am I to complain too loudly if I don't compete any longer?

If wanting to stay upside down and all wet, throwing ends, loops, cartwheels, phonic monkeys, free wheel, etc... then I'd get a c1. Call me old school but there's intrinsic value in keeping the boat up and dry. Ender into pirouette, then land in back into a hole, and pull of a 720... all the while head dry, upright, and the boat relativity dry... is a different skill. One that's called open boating. The comp of today, any old kayaker can do in a make-believe canoe.

Craig Smerda · Post by **Craig Smerda** » Fri Jul 15, 2011 1:09 am

yeah... but show me the hole required to do such moves in a trad-OC1 ?

this is the closest thing I've seen in some time to what you are describing... small "full volume" boat... medium feature... skilled paddler.

https://www.facebook.com/video/video.ph ... 7223090150

I can assure you... those moves in that hole with that paddler aren't going to happen in a "big boat".

can a longer OC1 (let's say 9ft-n-change) do an ender-piroutte-land back in the hole-spin-etc. on a smaller feature?... nope... and I know because I've tried. on a big feature maybe... in a huge feature?... potentially.

that all being said... how many of these moves that you're describing can be done in any traditional OC at todays He11-Hole? my guess is... not many... not consistently... and not often.

RVDriver · Post by **RVDriver** » Fri Jul 15, 2011 3:39 pm

I can understand the sentiment of someone having an idea of how they think something like OC1 freestyle should go, watching it go in a completely different direction, and saying "F it, I'm out". And those still participating feeling like "If you don't like it, don't do it". Leads pretty quickly to a diminished field and a lot of bashing, about what we're seeing.

My take? Things need to be pushed in certain directions based on what the sport needs at a given point in time. Right now you see the NFL imposing rules to try to diminish the amount of head injuries, and a few years ago they were implementing rules to make offenses more dominant and make the passing game better. Defenses didn't like those rules or the new "don't touch the qb rules" but the game decided it's what the game needed. Sometimes you need to do what's good for the game. Not everyone is gonna like it, most of all the purists. There are those who would like to see the goalposts moved back to the front of the endzone where they "belong"....Nascar changing the drafting rules and using more restrictive restrictor plates, Tennis banning grunting, baseball implementing video review, NCAA not allowing their athletes to eat, the list goes on.

Are converted K1's good for OC1? Tough to say but you could argue both ways. They make more modern moves possible, but they also diminish the true spirit of OC1ing according to what we're hearing. Dane could have done very well in whatever boat you put him in, no doubt. Won the SUP race over there. Have a bathtub race and he's probably going to win that.

I think right now the new boats are good for the sport because they encourage participation by new, young boaters who want to throw the new tricks, potentially at the cost of a few old-school purists. You can't please everyone, so you need to figure out what's best for the game and go with that. If the purists would recognize the fact that designs are ever-evolving and allow time for over-reaching and then correction, they'd probably be happier. I think there is a place for temporary rule suspensions such as to allow converted K1's by some definition for some period of time if they are deemed good for increasing participation, then rolling it back to get back on track once it's done it's job, if indeed it has or even if it hasn't. Similarly, I think there's a case to be made to update the scoring sheet to encourage more participation by middle-tiered paddlers, but it may come at the cost of losing a few of the elite boaters right now who feel it would be unfair to them. It may be, but what does the game need? In my mind, participants above all, and participants who feel like they have a fighting chance without the need to practice 12 months a year everyday in a sport that offers just about no monetary reward. That's another topic.

People who want to see the sport grow or even maintain need to be willing to make some scarifices and comprimises and potentially operate in an environment that is admittedly less than ideal by their own standards. I think we need to listen to the people who have left the sport and find out why they left, and listen to people who are good candidates for particiaption and find out why they're not more involved. Calling OC1 freestyle a joke is a bit of an auspcious start to a dialog, but an admittedly effective one. I'm a programmer and look at things form a problem-solving point of view. The primary problem I see in freestyle is one of participation. What's the cause, what's a potential short term fix(triage) and what's a potential long term fix(surgery). Pretty simple.