RePost:Hard Work at the 2010 Blackburn – by Wesley Echols

The Blackburn is the premier ocean race on the East Coast due to a host of factors. First of all, it has a great history, from its inception back in 1987. It encourages all human-powered vessels, namely rowing craft of all kinds, sea kayaks, paddle boards, and yes, surfskis. Second, it is a challenging distance of approximately 20 miles. And third, it is mostly an open ocean event.

I often tell my non-paddling friends that the Blackburn is like the Boston Marathon of paddling here on the East Coast; you must do the Blackburn at least once. While I have done the Boston Marathon once in 1998 after qualifying the same year, I have now done the Blackburn eight times. My eight times is nothing compared to a few local paddlers like Ed Duggan (19 times), Mike Tracy (13 times) and Henry Szostek, a rower who has done every single Blackburn: 24!!

What do the Boston Marathon and Blackburn Challenge have in common besides roughly similar distances? Hard work! This takes the form of training. Whether you are in an open ocean rowing shell like Dan Gorriaran (1st overall) or Rich Klajnscek (2nd overall and Blackburn Race Director), or piloting a surfski, training is a must. While it is one thing to finish one of these events, it is quite another thing to race it. It matters not whether you are at the front of the pack or the back, hard training improves your times. You just have to look at the training schedule that Dan puts out for the rowers he coaches or the Ben Lawry (kayak coach) training plan. What is perhaps more impressive is, unlike the Elite paddlers and runners, we all have full time jobs, families, etc., and still find the time to train. One aspect of surfski racing that is different from running is that we are a very experienced (middle age group) of paddlers.

If you look at the top finishers, all but a few are in their 50’s, with the youngest in his early 30’s. Nevertheless, we continue to post personal records at the Blackburn. Bob Capellini posted his fastest time; his wife, Linda, admitted he has been paddling more than in previous years. Bob is 60! Bill Kuklinski upgraded this year to a high performance ski, and posted a PR. Eric McNett, 2nd place finisher, had his personal best. Other success stories were that Ed Duggan, through his hard work and rehab after suffering a broken leg this winter, completed his 19th Blackburn. Mike Chamness was also able to turn in an excellent time despite a back injury. Jim Hoffman, rehabbing this winter from shoulder surgery, also enjoyed himself, posting an excellent time along with tandem partner, Steve Delgaudio. Jim Gilligan joined Bob Capellini in the over 60 category and continued to power through yet another Blackburn. Jay Appleton has enjoyed a very good season, having focused on core training in the off season. It must be something in ocean air that keeps tugging at us to keep getting out there.

My Race within the Race

I talked to Chris and Tim before the race to discuss my race strategy. It basically came down to: Don’t go out too fast (Which I often do.), and keep my heart rate within a certain range so I have some left at the end for the final two mile sprint from the break wall. Flat, hot conditions were predicted, so the heat would be a factor, in addition to the weeds.

The start went off as planned with the lead group opening up a gap of 4 boat lengths within the 2 miles of the Annisquam River. Although as this point I had aspirations to close the gap, I wanted some help. I asked Rowan Sampson, who was next to me, if he wanted to close the gap on the lead pack but I got no response from Rowan. I knew I could close it solo but would suffer if I did not have some help. A half mile later, I asked Tim if he wanted to close it and he said, “No,” following his own strategy, so Rowan, Tim and I sometimes traded places riding each other’s wash. Chris was not too far behind, while Jay Appleton took a pull leading, until the group split at mile 4 with a surge by Rowan.

Now it was Rowan and I paddling together. While I had met Rowan last year at the Major’s Cup, I did not know much about him, but I learned more as we paddled together for what ended up being the entire race, almost side by side. He is a man of few words on the water.

While I had wanted to trade off riding each other’s wash, this was not the case. Rowan admittingly had raced twice last weekend and was now feeling those effects. So he was unable to pull. We did try it for about a half mile or so at mile 11 but my heart dropped to under 149, not where it should be if I didn’t want to get caught from behind. So we swapped places again, with me in the lead. At about mile 13, a boat wake from a lobster boat caused Rowan to turn as I went straight and I thought finally the tether had finally been broken. I now had a two or three gap lead for the next few miles until mile 15, around the 2 hours and 15 minute mark.

Tim Dwyer – 5th Overall

I paused for a quick power gel and like a suction cup; Rowan was back on my stern wash. Ugh! We paddled in this formation until we approached the breakwater at Dog Bar. To my surprise, I saw my training partner, Tim Dwyer, closing hard on our right. The three of us paddled along the breakwater together with Tim about a boat length ahead. As we made the final turn into the harbor, Tim cut the turn as close to the break wall as he could and accelerated! He instantly had a 2 boat length lead and I found myself trailing Rowan by another boat length. Having been in this position before, the famous two mile harbor sprint to the finish that never seems to end, I tried to catch any bump I could, as did Rowan. Tim now had increased his lead, and I was hoping Rowan would fade. He did not, so the three of us came across the line within a minute of each other in the same position, making it a hard fought finish. The hard work and training paid dividends again for all three of us.

Wesley – 7th Overall & Rowan Sampson – 6th Overall

I also wanted to thank the Blackburn Race Committee for doinganother great job organizing such a great race and being flexible on a number of issues that got resolved like the drafting rule which is now no drafting out of class which is super, and we finally go a newly designed Logo for the Blackburn Shirts. Yeah!!! And yes we got online registration and an updated Blackburn site as well!! Progress!!!

I spoke to Dana Gaines about his design and he said Gina Lampesi came up with the Logo and idea to have it encircle the map of the course, while Dana, a rower, paddler, (remember 19 times around the course), drew the map and added familiar tidbits about the course. Dana is a commercial artist and makes his home on Martha’s Vineyard.

The team at Surfskiracing.com is working with the Blackburn Committee to pilot age appropriate results. Most races of any kind now include age categories so we broke out the results by age, overall finish place, and place within your age division. So for example it is nice to know that the 1st place winner was 21 years younger than the 2nd place finisher and the 3rd place finisher was 10 years younger than the 4th place finisher. From this perspective, the theme of this article “training and hard work” is demonstrated whole heartily here.

The SR Race Series Results table is also a new edition so that the local paddlers can keep track of their results at a glance of the races they participated in. The top three overall winners of the series will be awarded prizes from Stellar Surfskis and SurfskiRacing.com. The intent of his new series was to be more inclusive of the local races that the racers participated in. More info to come.

Looking forward already to next year’s Blackburn Challenge!! ~ Wesley

Juniors = 39 years old and under 
Seniors = 40 to 49 years old           
Masters = 50 to 59 years old            
Veterans = 60 years old and above