During any long session or race, most of each stroke converts cleanly into forward motion. A small fraction gets diverted into correction, stabilization, and adjustment. Some of that cost comes from outside: the ocean pushes, [...]
Finishing well has little to do with who is most tired. Everyone is tired. What separates paddlers at the end of a race is not how much they have left, but how clearly they can [...]
The forecast you checked the night before is completely different when you wake up. The wind has increased, the swell period has changed, and there's a conversation happening near the water's edge about which direction [...]
The line appears before the decision to take it is fully formed. A shift in the water texture, maybe forty meters ahead, something about the way a long roller is organizing at an angle to [...]
The stroke catches and the boat runs. There is a feeling to it, a brief firmness in the water that holds long enough for the body to push through, and the boat moves with more [...]
Every local racing community has a structure. You know who the fast paddlers are, roughly how you stack up against them, and what a good day on the water looks like for you. That knowledge [...]
The 18th Sakonnet River Race went off without a hitch with a small group of New England surfski paddlers. Conditions were ideal for the 9.4 mile course. It was not the total grind up to [...]
Current is the quiet architect of many races. Unlike wind, it rarely announces itself. There is no sound, no visible force—just the subtle difference between working hard and going nowhere, or moving efficiently with effort [...]
Around the ninety-minute mark, a bump builds ahead and gets left alone. Not because of anything physical. The opportunity was real. But a sprint that reads as obvious on a twenty-minute run reads differently when [...]
The main concept behind "training" of any sort is that damage accumulates when work occurs, and adaptation happens during recovery. There's a well-established process at this point for optimizing our adaptation mechanism to quickly achieve [...]
After months of intensive lobbying of race director Tim Dwyer, I managed to have last year's Narrow River Race expunged from the records. Delayed from April to October by COVID and subsequently capped at only 10 paddlers, one can hardly tolerate such an illegitimate farce disgracing the official annals. I felt [...]
We had an excellent turnout for yesterday's race comprised of surf skis, kayak(Jim), tandem canoe( Gus and Jerry), and OC1 (Carol) on a beautiful day. In this mix of paddlers was a convert from sea kayak to surfski (Jeff), a top-notch triathlete( Loukia), and new racer Josko, first time Narrow River [...]
Another Blackburn is in the books. It’s such a fun race and supportive community, I’m always excited to sign up. Then, come the 2/3 or 3/4 mark, I’m even more excited to be done with it. I came in “first place,” which honestly is not much of a feat considering I [...]
What a turnout today for the Essex River Race!!! The most entrants ever according to Bill K., race director, and company. They did a fantastic job, organizing the race again this year. So thanks to Bill and everyone who helped put on the race. Also thanks to Andrew Binks who unfortunately [...]
The Narrow River Race typically serves as a gentle introduction to the New England racing season - a controlled opportunity for us to get our feet wet. Indeed, the winding tidal estuary is so shallow that it'd be impossible to get any other part of your body wet without lying down [...]
I've had enough. I'm tired of constantly explaining that the Sakonnet River Race takes place in the ocean. One year I had T-shirts printed up that said "The Sakonnet River Isn't", but this might have been too subtle - people kept spinning me around by my shoulders to read the rest [...]
Over my years of racing, my goal has been to try to optimize my boat choice for a particular race based on the conditions of that race and my skill level at that point in time. As we all know, our skill level changes over time if you paddle regularly (2-5 [...]
In my garage and basement I have my favorite skis. As usual it is a mix of advanced skis (Think Uno 2g, Ion 3G, Epic V12 2g, Stellar SEL 2G, Nelo 560M and intermediate skis( Nelo 550, Stellar SR 2G, SEI 2G, Think Evo 2, Evo 3). Of the advanced [...]
Last week I got to try the pint-size Think Jet. It comes in at 17ft by 19 inches and accommodates 80 lbs to 165 lbs. While I am clearly over the weight limit, I took it for a 30-minute paddle yesterday to get a feel for it. It is designed [...]
Nelo 2011/2012 Vintage Review Introduction For a few years I have been intrigued with the Nelo surf skis, the Vintage and the Ocean Ski models, because of their brilliant colors, sleek profile and known quality of their world famous K1’s. Chris Chappell, web master, was also very curious about the [...]