Kettle Island Race, 2nd Longest Race of Season by Wesley Echols

We are fortunate in New England to have some of the best places to paddle with easy access. Lynn Park in Beverly, Massachusetts is one of those places. Ed Duggan of The Kayak Learning Center host the race as well as the Salem League Training Races.  With so many races under our belts this season, the thought of doing a 15 mile race seemed arduous. However, the weather was perfect with little wind and sunny skis. I say little wind because this stretch along the coast with so many islands and reefs can get extremely rough and chaotic under the right conditions like last year.  Because of the underlying topography, the water is still challenging always undulating and not straight forward. It reminds me of the section on the Blackburn course, miles 14-17 and the Double Beaver course. 

Post Race

We had a small but competitive group of New England paddlers including local standouts Eric McNett,Greg Lesher, and Jan Lupinski who finished 1,2,3 respectively leaving the rest of the field to race among ourselves. Like most races this season, this trio has dominated the the top of the standings. As the race unfolded, two separate and distinct lines evolved, one hugged the shore led by Eric and another off shore lead by Greg with Jan joining. I chose the outer shore line along with Ken Cooper, Joe Shaw, and Kirk Olsen as we picked our way through the islands headed to Kettle Island seven miles up the coast before we turned to head back home. On the way out I was in between groups so after a mile I merged with Ken Cooper who trains on this course weekly.  Our pack of Joe Shaw, Ken, Kirk(for a short time) and myself were paddling hard but comfortably.  Ken and I compared heart rates at one point and they were identical at 161 pushing similar class boats, me in my new Evo2 and Ken in his newer V10sport. We were making good progress and could see Peter Kahn from Vermont off to our left. Ken commented we were slowly reeling Peter in.  I was anxious to reel him in quickly but Ken reminded me that it is a long race. This was at mile 5.5. I stepped off the gas for a short time, then pulled along side Peter as Ken dropped back a few boat lengths. Joe was always right behind us taking it all in.  

Skippers Meeting

At we approached Kettle Island, Matt Drayer taking the inside line merged with our group. As we all rounded Kettle virtually together, I kept the pace up and was leading this group headed back to Lynn Park. At this point, Jan was a tiny spec on the horizon so he offered little help in what line to take on the way back.  My GPS manage to get water under the screen so I could only see my HR and time but not the distance. I kept heading toward the shore while Joe and Ken stayed out some. I often would look back to see where they were to make sure I was not totally off course.  Joe I could spot a few times but Ken was no where to be found until mile 13 where I was suprised he was so close. With Ken closing, I upped my pace and HR from 152 to 160, then to 164 for the final mile to out last Ken only by a thirty second margin. Ken and I have been relatively close for some of the races including the L2L where both of us had disappointing races. Today was different where both of us had good races finishing 4th and 5th. 

Thanks to Ed for putting hosting the race and making sure there was a safety boat. Speaking of boats, Mike McDonough got to try his new Huki S1R, Chris Sherwood got to race a V8 for the first time and I got to race my Evo 2 for the first time. Only one ocean race left on the calendar, the Maine Downwind race Oct 12. We should have an excellent turnout for this race. 

Wesley and Evo 2

MaryBeth Gangloff     Huki S1R     3:03:37
 
1.Eric McNett                Epic V10      2:08:42
2.Greg Lesher                Epic  V10     2:09:48
3.Jan Lupinski               Epic V10      2:12:58
4. Wesley Echols          Think Evo2  2:16:17
5.Ken Cooper                 Epic Sport    2:16:30
6.Joe Shaw                      Stellar SES    2:17:59
7.Peter Kahn                  Epic V10      2:19:32
8.Matt Drayer                Epic Sport   2:21:07
9.John Mathieu             Epic V10     2:21:25
10.Kirk Olsen                  Epic V12      2:22:08
11.Bruce Deltorchio    Epic V8        2:22:38
12Mike McDonough    Huki  S1R    2:22:45
13.Bob Capellini           Epic V8         2:27:48
14.Chris Sherwood     Epic V8        2:42:58
Chris Chappell              Huki S1XL   DNF
Francisco Urena          Stellar SE    DNS