It’s all about the Surfskis in Rhode Island: Weekend with Sean Rice, Battle the Bay Race and Surfski Workshops.

Racers Battle of the Bay

Racers Battle of the Bay

For the second year in a row, World Champion Sean Rice included Newport, Rhode Island on his Paddle Life Tour of workshops. Tim Dwyer hosted Sean so it made the logistics of the Battle of the Bay Race, Sean’s intermediate and advanced clinics super easy since Tim lives a few hundred yards from our local put in, the Bay Voyage Inn.

Sean Advance Workshop

Sean’s Advance Workshop

For those of you who don’t know, Rhode Island(the Ocean State) is a wonderful place to paddle with easy public access and a variety of conditions for all skill levels and is wonderfully scenic.  It is one of the sailing capitals of the world along with being a tourist destination with the beaches, history, mansions, food, etc. For all these reasons, we host the Narrow River Race, Sakonnet Race, Ride the Bull, Double Beaver Race, and Battle the Bay Race, yes five races for all our enjoyment.

As any ethnographer will tell you, ritual humiliation is an essential component of indoctrination ceremonies in primitive cultures. They generally don't use the loaded word "primitive" nowadays, but in this case, I think they'd make an exception.

Jim, John, Sean and Greg podium finishers of Battle of the Bay

Warming up with Sean Rice

Warming up with Sean Rice

After a week long sales meeting in California, I was looking forward to the weekend.  It began with one on one, personal instruction from Sean, which many of us took advantage of. With so much video of myself, and with Tim’s kayak erg, I thought it might be just as beneficial for Sean to view my stroke online, critique it, and then hop on the erg for solutions. This worked out great. Sean confirmed some obvious areas of improvement(elbows too high) along with other not so obvious areas of improvement on my stroke and my training. So I came away feeling energized and ready to implement the solutions we discussed. With a race every weekend for the next month, my plan is to fully engage my stroke development in the off season since I paddle year around. This will set me up for a more productive season next year. Like any technique training, you must first be open to new ideas, then practice, practice, the suggestions that have been made to you.

Both the workshops for the novice and the advanced groups were fully attended with Sean adding some elements that were different from last year. Below is my video of my race, at least part of it.  Thanks to Sean and Tim for making this all happen.

Paddle The Bay 2016 Video from Wesley Echols on Vimeo.