Christmas Barge

I am feeling really positive about my kayaking at the moment. I think I banished a few demons by going out midweek, another session on Sunday cemented my feeling that I could be able to do the DW in my new boat. There are still some concerns, but not as many.

Heading to Chichester canal with my DW partner who took out an old Talisman that she bought a few weeks ago because she is worried that her Hobby2 is too heavy. Considering it is December, the weather was really mild and unlike my session on Thursday there was pleasantly no wind.

We set off at a fair pace and stayed mostly together, though early on I was struggling with stability when I got into the churned water of her wash. There were also few narrow boats out doing a Father Christmas run http://chichestercanal.org.uk/boat-trips/father-christmas/, which gave me more churned water to deal with. I wimped out when they went past deciding to hug the bank and wait for the wash to pass rather than paddle through and risk a capsize.

After we turned in the basin I waited for a stunted little barge to leave ahead of me not realising that I would have been considerably faster than it had I committed to go, I then found myself stuck behind it unable to get too close because if I found the wake from a slender Talisman a bit of a problem, the backwash from this inelegant tub was causing me havoc. Eventually they slowed to observe a belligerent heron and I gritted my teeth and ploughed through the bow wave.

I had fallen some distance behind my friend and really had to put the power down to catch up. I found my focus and worked really hard trying to keep the paddle cadence up. Usually when I try to speed up I eventually catch the paddle awkwardly and end up setting myself up for a tank slapper but for about two kilometres I was in the zone. I don’t think I have worked that hard in a kayak for a long time but was a really nice feeling to be flying along only focusing on catch, rotate, power, catch, rotate, power.

We started a second lap and I was much happier dealing with the disturbed water from another kayak, probably because I had to deal with that barge earlier in the morning. We had some impromptu “efforts” whenever we drew alongside (you remember efforts from when I had that taster session at the Wey kayak club?) at full power I was generally the faster, be it I have a quicker boat, more strength, or both.

We had completed 10k in a little under an hour and twenty minutes and I finally had to deal with my current nemesis, namely getting out. I decided to try this week from a fishing pontoon rather than at the quayside where we put in, because it was a little bit lower (and wasn’t made of concrete which has been scratching my boat). I did achieve what I think is my first dry exit from a K1 but it wasn’t pretty and for anyone watching I'm certain it resembled a seal hauling itself onto a beach.

I think I have two main challenges at the moment, dealing with turbulent water and getting out of my boat for portages. Both essential for the DW but they are bite sized things to work on.

Last Annual Leave before Christmas

In my last post I vocalised that fact that I was starting to get a bit concerned by how little time I have spent in my boat, especially considering it still gives me a little fright every time I think I have tamed the wobble. Well I decided to do something about it and took my last remaining holiday off specifically to go for a paddle.

I headed for my favourite section of canal in Chichester (it’s not my favourite section of canal, that honour goes to the first few miles of the Llangollen canal from Hurleston, but Chichester seems to be the only place I am comfortable to paddle my K1 at the moment) and put on for a solo paddle.

I had a tail wind for the first 2kms as I headed toward the basin which helped with my speed and not long after I had started I achieved my max speed of the day. Turning around was a bit sketchy as the wind caught me and my boat at an angle which nearly saw me swimming, and it wasn’t until it was against me did I realise what a boon it had been for the first two kilometres.

After about 40 minutes or so I had completed a lap of the canal and usually I would stop there, but I had taken a day’s holiday for this and I was going to make the most of it. I headed off again for another trip to the basin and back which rounded the total distance up to 10kms.

I didn’t fall in… Well. I didn’t fall in while paddling which was a pleasant change. I did still have to throw in a few support strokes every now and then but in general I felt very confident in the boat. I do seem to have a problem getting out of it though, in fact, I don’t think I have managed a dry exit yet. I pulled up to the bank tried a couple of times to get out before finally losing the battle and plopped in, which was a shame as it had been a very successful paddle up to that point. My concern is the 77 portages on the DW, which currently means 77 dunkings.

Word of the Week

It has now been three weeks since I have sat in my kayak (in fact any kayak, mine or otherwise) and I can’t believe how quickly this month is flying by. Ongoing manflu, injuries, the grim weather, and other prior commitments, have kept me in rude supply of believable excuses for staying away from the water. I am however painfully aware that I have a boat that is more unstable than I am used to sitting in my back garden and not being practiced in, while the Devises to Westminster race creeps ever closer. I’m actually not too worried about the race per se, I have battered myself on multi day events a few times and know that I have the minerals to get to the end. But if keep putting off this training malarkey I might not be quick enough to make it to the end. This post is essentially me voicing my own kick up the bum to go and train in my boat.

I do want to talk about other sports today though. Predominantly this blog is about my journey to get to the DW and I don’t want to venture too far from topic but I am, to a degree, using other sports to improve my fitness for the race so it is sort of about the DW… Isn’t it?

Anyway Quadrathlon is the word of the week. It’s like a triathlon but with a kayak interval throw in to join the run, ride, and swim. Up until yesterday I hadn’t really given this sport a thought, I think I was aware that a multi-discipline event with a kayak section might exist but I hadn’t looked into it at all… I take part in the other sports individually already and when my DW partner mentioned the quad to me, a little seed was sewn.

There is a long way to go with this, a tri specific wetsuit, and a tri-suit will need to be found, and I will need to work on my running, riding, and swimming in addition to kayaking if I am to finish anywhere but last (and as it seems that there are usually quite small fields of entrants the chances of being at the back are high). There is however a quadrathlon next September held in my old hometown and I am very seriously considering entering. The idea of this event has really got me excited, probably because I haven’t done it before, and at the moment I am mentally working up a training plan. I guess only time will tell if this really is my new passion or just simply the word of the week…

I have a Cold.

I was feeling pretty rough with some kind of head cold this week, and with the weather being a bit Novemberly it combined to make for a fairly uninspiring kayaking session on Saturday.

I had intended to tighten my rudder cable before my next session in the kayak, so while my other half was out I brought the boat into the house so I could tinker in the dry (it was raining). I thought I knew how to do it having spied a couple of locking nuts attached to the cable behind the footplate I had formulated a plan which involved screwdrivers and really long arms. Quite quickly I managed to remove one of the nuts, I attempted and failed to pull the cable tight and then spent another hour trying to put the nut back to its original position. This morning I have had a look on the internet and I think I should have been looking at the rudder end of the boat to tighten the cable, I will have another go before the next trip.

My DW partner and I headed for Chichester canal again (once my boat was put back together) with a plan to do a couple of circuits to extend the distance we have so far been covering. It was cold, and drizzling and just a bit grotty and after paddling for just under 2 kilometres I fell in. I think I was avoiding a fisherman’s line but to be honest I wasn’t feeling great (with my cold) and almost certainly just lost a bit of concentration. I saddled up though and carried on down to the basin and was able to maintain a nice steady pace.

While turning in the basin, at the furthest point from the bank I thought to myself that it would be a rubbish place to capsize, as if to prove it to myself I accidently caught my paddle edge and promptly capsized. The water was deep and cold and it was very much a rubbish place to fall in. Getting the boat back to the jetty took an age, and by the time I had fished myself out I was very cold. Boat emptied we headed back the way we came, but I was feeling a bit miserable with a cold (germs) and cold (temperature) so we didn’t go for another lap, instead packed up and heading home.

I felt much quicker (when I was not swimming) this week. I had put some markers on my paddle so I was always holding the paddle correctly, and despite the fact that I fell in a couple of times I did feel more stable than ever so was able to focus more on technique. Whenever I wanted to I was able to put the power down and cruise past my friend in her more stable but slower Hobby2. Average speed this week was again 7.9km/h despite falling in twice, and I hit a slightly higher top speed of 11.2km/h. I need to sort out my rudder though as it is becoming tiresome to steer with something so vague.

Missing Wing Nuts

Finally, I get to write a positive post. After last week’s machinations I did decide to get the lime green racing machine after all. It sat there all shiny and new, every day calling me to go out to play until finally on Sunday I got to give her a real shake down. The boat wasn’t the only piece of kit that I was trying out for the first time this week. My DW partner found a set of second hand split wings somewhere or other and they arrived midweek and I also bought myself the nookie softcore I had been hankering after (and it won’t feature much more in this post but it is as warm and as lovely as I knew it would be).

We headed off to the Chichester canal again. The section we have been paddling is a 3 kilometre long L shape with a turning basin at one end and is pretty much sealed at the other end by the B2201 going through it (which makes going any further a bit tricky). It does offer a 6k round trip though and is relatively shallow so perfectly fine for shorter practice runs (especially in a new boat).

There were a few teething problems before we were able to get onto the water. The first being my new split paddles. The locking mechanism is a bit fiddly with a sleeve and screw collar so once I had set the feather angle and began tightening it the blade twisted around a little bit. That would be okay if I was able to set the feather angle correctly in the first place but for some reason my brain wanted me to set it up as a left handed paddle. I needed to compare it with my friends paddle to work out how what it should look like. The other problem was the foot rest fell out of the boat. There were a couple of loose wing nuts in the cockpit when I got the boat home after buying it and unfortunately this didn’t set any alarm bells off at the time. On Sunday when I lifted the boat up the footrest fell free and was a real pain in the cockpit to get back into place. Five minutes of fiddling later it clicked home though and I was pretty confident it wouldn’t come out again for this short trip despite not having any nuts to lock it back in... I was correct.  

If you’ve read any of this blog it won’t come as a surprise that I have been getting increasingly sick of falling in. My poor choice in the previous boat didn’t help but even the borrowed boat from Wey kayak club knocked my confidence as it was more tippy than I was happy with. I was understandably nervous about this new K1 but for a couple of reasons I seem to have found the one. The seat is more moulded (and comfortable) than most K1 seats I have come across, I think it is called a descent seat, and the contact points with my bum and hips seemed more akin to a white water boat. The boat is also designed for my weight so the boat sits in rather than on the water. I felt stable, it is light and really fast and I confidently declared (with a grin on my face) that this is the boat I will complete the 2016 DW race in.

There are a few things which I noticed from this week that I need to remedy. As I’ve mentioned lots of times on this blog, I have been in or about kayaking for the best part of thirty years and I like to think that I know how a paddle works, unfortunately it seems I don’t. I was a little bit annoyed with the fact that I couldn’t get the feather right but this is my first pair of split paddles so I can forgive myself of that crime I suppose, a little indicator line painted on the shaft to show where I want the blades to align is all that is needed there. What I am more annoyed about is that I was holding the paddle asymmetrically and it wasn’t until I saw the photos that I spotted the problem. I’m going to put a couple of bits of tape to mark where I want my hands to go but this is novice stuff. The other thing is that I also need to do is take the slack out of the rudder cable, at the moment the steering is as vague as in a 20 year old Land Rover and a couple of times I picked up the pace to race past my friend and each time the boat veered off toward the bank, the faster I went the more unable to turn I became. Oh, yeah, also we need to get a kayak spares kit put together which will include amongst other things, wing nuts.

This week Strava says I covered 6 kilometres, in 45:51 with a maximum speed of 10.8km/h and an average speed 7.9km/h (or 118 miles per day)

The Lime Green Racing Machine

This blog post is going to be a bit of a brain dump for me, I don’t even know how it’s going to end but hopefully it will be cathartic and help me come to some kind of decision on a boat.

This weekend began with the kayak gods smiling on me. After the Thruster left my all too brief care earlier in the week to go to a better home and hopefully a better paddler I was left without a K1, I had a relatively small budget to play with and the clock is very much ticking for training. Then out of the blue I received a letter from the bank saying that they had made a terrible mistake on a loan I had long forgotten about and wanted to make it up to me by sending some apology money, overnight the budget for my kayak doubled.

This meant that Sunday we had a road trip to Southampton to look at a boat I have had an eye on for a little while, a Knysna Lancer CX. Looking over the internet the manufacturer says it is a stable boat for the smaller paddler, which could mean anything but with a weight limit of 80kg, I’m going to be at the top end of that. It does look great though, the gel coat on the one I am looking at is a love/hate lime green colour which I very firmly love, and it has a tiller which I am more familiar with as opposed to the gas pedals that were on the Thruster. This boat ticked most of the boxes for me, the only thing left was to try her out for stability.

We met the seller next to a river for a test drive, and lowering myself into the kayak I was greeted with the all too familiar wobble of these unruly boats. Once I got the boat underway I did feel more stable than I ever did in the Thruster, and although it was quite sketchy turning the boat around I didn’t swim and consoled myself that you don’t often do 180 degree turns in K1s. According to my wife, I looked a lot more comfortable in it, and I didn’t have to throw in many low braces to remain dry for once. I think that some of the stability comes from the fact that I am near the design weight and the boat felt like it was more in the water, with the Thruster I was nearly fifty kilograms lighter than the stated weight so often it felt as though the boat was balancing on the surface.

I decided to sleep on the decision and ended up spending most of the rest of the day, and a fitful night of sleep replaying in my mind every wobble and incident that occurred during my first DW race, this time in a lime green boat wondering how I would cope. Most of my thoughts were of the last day on the Thames because the river is huge, the waves are many and I really don’t want to fall in.

So is this the racing kayak for me? It’s a lovely boat and is practically brand new with not a scratch on her, it looks great, is light, comfortable, and fast, and is possibly a good wobble factor for me… The “but” is that it is a lot of money to spend on a kayak that I may chicken out on paddling and decide is too wobbly to take on the DW. I’ve already done that once and I don’t want to do it again... The wobbles that I had when testing though were the familiar ones and maybe they are in the nature of K1 racing and I just need to man up and accept the perpetual threat of falling in if I let my guard down. Argh. I just don’t know!

I told the seller that I would let him know if I wanted it or not today so I really should make my mind up on this boat soon.

She's gone.

This will be the shortest blog post I will ever write. (Mainly because I know full well I write too much and even now, while I ironically pad this blog post with meaningless guff, I won’t be able to match my usual ramblings for word count).

Anyway… Things move quickly in the kayaking world… approximately 48 hours quickly… On Sunday after giving her a clean and polish I took half a dozen photos of Petra, the soon to be sold K1, to be posted online for sale, and yesterday (Tuesday) evening I was helping strap her to someone else’s car. That’s it. She has gone.

So now I don’t have a boat for the DW. Hopefully something will turn up, otherwise it will be a long swim to Westminster.

I suppose I should change my profile picture now...

It’s official. I don’t like her!

It was only a matter of time before I decided enough was enough. She was just too unstable, one wrong move and I was punished, and far too harshly in my opinion. No man deserves to be dumped in the water for no reason whatsoever and as a result Petra, the Popes-Canoe Thruster is up for sale! I think I had realised that I wouldn’t be able to tame her in time for the DW a few weeks ago but I finally admitted to myself that the boat wasn’t for me this weekend. Hopefully we will find a buyer and be able to get another boat soon but until then I still need to get out there and get paddle fit… So Sunday I did.

The plan for the weekend was pretty simple; paddle for as long and as hard as possible so that I would feel the workout in the morning. Unlike the training I have been doing so far which has focused on learning to handle a K1, this time I was happy to take out pretty much anything that floated and intended to just get the muscles firing. One of my favourite boats is my Pyranha Speeder, she is a kind of hybrid between a down river racer and a white water kayak, stable and has a good turn of speed considering her weight, ideal for this weekend.

I collected my DW partner and headed to Shoreham which is about half an hour drive for me, to put on the River Adur. As it’s tidal we had to take tide times into account, so aimed to hit slack water for a paddle upstream and a falling tide for the return.

As I was hauling my Speeder along while my friend had her much lighter and more slippery K1 I was always going to struggle to keep up but I gave it my best and I don’t think I held us up too badly. I did have to use all of my river craft and wash hanging skills to maintain the pace she was setting but for about an hour we paddled quickly and non-stop.

I had made a pretty big mistake though. For some reason I decided a dry suit was a good idea (I appreciate the K1 fraternity don’t wear such cumbersome equipment but I don’t like being cold and wet). The weather was warmer than I gave it credit for considering we are at the end of October, and I also had my neoprene spraydeck and buoyancy aid on so after that hour I was practically steaming inside my waterproof, man shaped, bag. Even the (part accident/part deliberate) dip when I got out the boat when we stopped for a comfort break did little to cool me down.

The tide turned, and we followed suit enjoying the double advantage of a falling tide and river flow. I was starting to struggle to steer the Speeder toward the end, I’m not sure if it was due to the moving water, or the fact that I was getting tired and my edge turns (There’s no rudder on a Speeder) were getting sloppy, but I was glad to see the get out beach.

This week was the biggest paddle we have done together and certainly the longest I have been in a boat since early July, covering a little over 14kms, worth just under two hours, with an average of about 8kms an hour (or as we were on tidal waters… 4.3 knots). My dry suit was a bit of a misnomer though as the clothes I was wearing underneath were soaked with sweat and I probably would have finished drier without it.  

Going Clubbing

It has been a few weeks since I have been in a kayak, it is now pretty much too dark to go before or after work so I am restricted to weekend. For whatever reason(s, of which there were many) I wasn’t in the mood for going last week but this Saturday I did get back on the water courtesy of Wey Kayak Club.

My DW partner-in-crime joined the club to improve her skills in this kayaking malarkey and she convinced me to come along to the club so I could go out for a longer paddle, in a boat I am more comfortable in, with coaches around to improve my skill. I am actually surprised with how much I got from the experience of a club environment and am pleased I went… I am very much considering joining Wey myself.  

After a brief chat with one of the coaches I chose a boat that we thought would suit my abilities, I can’t remember the name of but has a wobble factor around about 6 or 7. It was a Sipre something-or-other but I can’t find it online at the moment. We joined in with a group of paddlers and set off for a 5-ish mile paddle at what initially was a more than comfortable pace for me. After a brief feeling of instability I quickly found form and quite enjoyed paddling for more than 100 metres above the surface again.

The group spread out as we were encouraged to do “Efforts”, 30 strokes at full power followed by 20 recovery strokes. While I was generally at the front of the group whenever we had an Effort, my friend was always ahead of me and I was not able to catch her, Especially on the return journey as I was starting to tire and only able to keep on my full-tilt, full-power, red-hot, maximum pace for maybe thirty seconds before I would start to fade.

Having coaches on hand was new for me, I don’t remember being taught to kayak when I was younger though I assume I must have been, and for the last few years I have been a kayak coach myself, so having someone else on hand to point out where I can improve was really helpful. I was annoyed with myself because I was being picked up on things that I pick up on with other people’s technique but I will focus more to fix myself. My white water kayaking technique was also called out as I couldn’t keep my knees together in the boat for very long, I think they thought I was trying to brace on the cockpit coaming but in reality my leg muscles (my inner thighs mainly) were tiring from holding my knees together.

At the end of the session I was able to try out a Kirton Tor. It's stability was slightly lower than the boat I had been using but was a lovely paddle and within my own instability comfort zone, I now know what boat I want for the DW... If only I can find one.

I did manage to put the session on Strava (though not all of it as I had forgotten to press start until we had turned around and were on the way back). Of the 4.4 kilometres I recorded I averaged 6.9kph and hit a top speed of 11.2kph. I don’t think that the data is meaningful at the moment but if that is my true pace I will complete the DW in about 30 hours!

On Sunday I went for a 1km swim. It didn’t involve a canal or a kayak, was intentional, and in a very nice heated swimming pool. I ached afterwards despite once being able to thrash out that sort of distance without a care, it made me realise that I am no longer as fit as I once was.

Things I am taking away from this weekend…
1. I need to get a more stable boat. I think Petra’s days are numbered.
2. I need to kayak (and generally exercise) more.
3. Despite being a kayaker for nearly 30 years, my DW partner is better than me… and she has only been doing this for eight or so weeks.

Back in the boat

I got back into the kayak. It was last weekend, Sunday I think. Details are a bit hazy as I have spent the best part of this week in Sicily on a trip with work and am still in recovery mode but I will attempt to remind myself about what happened (kayaking last weekend, not what happened Sicily).

I think it’s fair to say that the trip to the canal was more successful than the first time I was there, if nothing else I could actually count the number of times I fell in. Twice. First swim was right at the beginning after lowering myself into the boat. I think I had told myself that I was going to fall in so I then obliged. After that first dip I actually managed to stay mostly upright for the whole 4k round trip. It involved 100% concentration and many support strokes to get to the end of the canal but I managed it. Turning the boat at the end was a nervy affair and I opted to turn in the confines of the canal rather than heading out into the turning basin (which seemed to have no places to swim the boat to in the event of a capsize). Heading back up the canal I found some confidence and was able to keep the boat moving for most of the 2km stretch back to the put in. The second dunking was as a result of my bouncing the boat to try and shift the branches and leaves that were accumulating on my bow (that brought my confidence level back to a sensible level).

My wife came along to walk the dog and recorded several videos of my paddling. Watching back I don’t look confident, each stroke is hesitant and clearly not delivering much power which is disappointing as I thought I was going to look really awesome this week.

When I was in Sicily it was approximately 30 degrees, the sea was warm and one morning I even watched a pair of Nelo K1’s heading out. I came into work today in the fog, my ice warning light was on in the car and right now I am trying to decide whether I should go kayaking at the weekend again. I know the chances of a swim in the cold grim canal is quite high and as I think about dragging myself out of the muddy, nettle fringed banks, Sicily seems a very long way away.  

Not a happy paddler

I’m feeling pretty bruised today. These bruises are from last night’s kayak session though I use the word kayak lightly, as approximately fifty percent of the time it was a swimming session, the constant falling out, bailing, and getting back in the boat took its toll. I lost count the number of times I capsized in the hour or so we were on (and/or in) the water.

When we have been at the lake I blamed the need to turn, or the inability to get up to a good speed as the reason I found the boat tippy so last night after work we headed to a canal so I could prove to myself that I can kayak after all. We met with another experienced K1 paddler and I hoped that I would get a chance to talk to her about boats and technique and other canoey things but within not many paddle strokes I was swimming. In the end I waved the other two away so they didn’t spend the whole session waiting for me and so that I could enjoy my own soggy misery by myself.

I don’t think I am being big headed when I say that I have a great paddle technique. I have owned fast boats (my Pyranha Speeder is an all-time favourite) for years and have really focused on my straight line paddling, unlike a lot of paddlers new to sprint and marathon boats I don’t really have to learn this skill, I thought I would just be able to focus on keeping a tippy boat upright but that is proving to be a much harder task than I thought. As I write this I am still unsure how or why I fall in. It happens so fast, there must be something I am doing wrong I just don’t know what it is. I am able to push away (shakily) from the bank, and once I have both hands on the paddle I’m able to start moving, quite quickly too. Once I thought I was in control I started to relax into my technique, then bam, soaked. Sometimes I was able to drop a brace in and save it, turning an instant dunking into a rather protracted tank slapper, but most of the time it happened so unexpectedly that I didn’t have time to react.

I’m not a quitter, sometimes I’m too lazy to start something but I rarely give up on things. This boat is making me have second thoughts though, I’m starting to think that I am not going to be able to master it, pretty soon the water is going to be fowl rather than mildly chilly making a capsize a breath-taking nightmare rather than just being a bit annoying.

Right now I don’t want to get back into the boat. This blog might become much shorter than I intended.

The Equipment

I seem to be spending a fortune at the moment. The big expense, the boat, is going to have cost me about £500 after I take into account the petrol, the fuel pump man, and the diesel that was part of the expedition to collect the boat. On top of that I had to get a roof rack, (technically I was going to have to get a roof rack anyway as I have just got a new car but it feels like this DW quest pushed the need for one higher up the list). Then I had to get V-bars, I didn’t need them for the Surprise as she is a solid boat but Petra is a more fragile creature and I didn’t want to stress the hull in transit. I have wanted wing paddles for a long time and a cheap set was thrown in with the sale of another boat, for £40 they’re great but the plastic wings are a bit heavy for my liking, so I am on the look-out for a much lighter set with split shafts. So, what’s that? About £850 so far.

Today I started to wonder how much more I would have to spend, so this post is an exploration into what equipment I still want/need, and I want to explain what kit worked for me and what I am going to improve it with. Which then brings me onto my secret narcissistic desire that this blog has been found by another DW hopeful who like me, is trawling the internet looking for information and help, and that this blog is the one which gives the answers they have yet to find… If that’s you reading this… You’re welcome.

What equipment did I need for the DW a couple of years ago?

Boat. Mine was heavy. It got me to the end but I wanted a faster, lighter craft. Well I have a faster boat, at the cost of stability.

Paddle. I completed my first DW with my general purpose paddles. They are great and were quite expensive when I got them. Cranked carbon shaft, and tear drop blades. But I wanted wings. I admit it might be partly because everyone else had wings, but they must do more than look good. I now have wing blades and they do seem to be making a difference. I just want some better ones now.

Clothing. Starting from the bottom…

Footwear. I have a pair of neoprene boots and a pair of neoprene socks they weren’t too expensive and are good bits general kayaking kit. I’m pretty certain I wore the same ones for the last DW and my feet were not cold then. It worked for me then, it will work for me now.

Legs. I have a pair of dry trousers which I got for white-water paddling which were great on DW especially when I fell in trying to get out at a really high portage. I’m probably going to wear those again. Underneath though I wore a pair of tracksuit bottoms that I bought about a week before Easter, I didn’t wear them in the boat until race day and regretted it, they were not cut for kayaking. I think I will try and find some kayak specific long-johns (and will use them during training).

Middle. I have a really nice Nookie thermal softcore that I have owned since forever. I was devastated when I tore a sleeve a few years ago but my wife modified it and turned it into a shorty which I still wear paddling. I think I will have to get a new long sleeve one before the race. As the outer I have a white water dry cag which I wore for the race which was not so good. While I remained very dry, the rubber gaskets at my neck and wrists became uncomfortable for the long duration paddling, so I am going to have to find something to replace it this time. I like the look of the Palm Tempo so I currently have that on the list.

Hands. Poggies. Stupid name for a brilliant bit of kit. The first day of paddling I wore these really warm 5mm neoprene kayaking gloves, they were nice and toasty but held water against my skin for 9 odd hours, this made my hands do that wrinkly thing that you get in the bath but a thousand times worse, it was excruciatingly painful after I took the gloves off at the end of the day. Fortunately for me (less fortunate for my friends), my scout leader friends who were also doing the DW had not made the first day cut off time but did have a pair of poggies, so I was able to borrow some for the remainder of the race. I subsequently bought myself a pair for another race (The Great Glen Paddle. That is another much less successful story, and my planned return to that race will be another chapter in the future) so as long as I can find them at the back of the kayaking cupboard I am good.

Head. Fleece hat. I might treat myself to a new one but I am sure the hat I wore the last time is kicking about somewhere. I have also treated myself to a rather fetching beard and will keep for the race it so my chin stays warm. If you do have the opportunity to get one, I can heartily recommend them as they are cheap and make you look very manly.

Buoyancy aid. I have a jolly expensive one which I bought for my white water paddling and coaching and I think my wife will kill me if I plan to get a marathon specific BA. The cut is not too cumbersome and it is very comfortable.

Spraydeck. I saw lots of DW crews with zipped spraydecks and wondered what was the point of them? It wasn’t until I got onto the Thames section where decks were compulsory and put my own full deck on that I realised how much warmer they kept my legs, so I’m a convert, a zipped spraydeck means you can get the benefit from the cover without losing too much time during portages. Fortunately for me a zipped spraydeck was thrown in with the sale of one of the boats so I don’t need to splash out on one of those. 

Water bottle holder. Quickly changing water with your support crew is made simple with the Marsport water bottle holder and bespoke bottles with straws cut to the right length. I’m sure there are other drinking solutions available but most of the crews I saw were using them so it must be pretty good. I have a holder and many bottles from the last race.

Apart from the compulsory race kit (which I also probably have kicking around somewhere) I just need/want to get, Long-Johns, a Nookie thermal softcore top, and a Palm Tempo jacket. Oh. And some carbon wing paddles. Roll on Christmas.

What's in a Name?

It was another lovely weekend to take the kayaks swimming, so on Saturday I headed down to the lake again, joined once more by Hannah my fellow DW partner who was piloting her own K1, and also by a friend of mine who is an excellent kayaker in his own right though doesn’t race. He took out The Surprise, my DW boat from 2013. The Surprise is very stable, and although Hannah has only been paddling for a few months she is more than capable of keeping her boat, A Hobby2, upright. I knew that I would be the one most likely to get wet so I set everyone’s expectations suitably low and let them get on the water before me.

I actually surprised myself with how much more confident I felt this week. It's been seven days since I was last in the boat and I had mostly spent that time mentally battling the kayak demons. As I mentioned I am a long time paddler but this K1 has put me back to school, I haven’t felt like a novice in a boat since I was about ten. Despite much bravado, I am genuinely concerned by the wobbliness of the boat and with the Thames section on the last day, it was only mildly choppy when I ran the 16 mile section and I witnessed several single and double crews take a dunking, so how am I going to fare next year?

After pushing warily away from the side I joined the other two boats circling the lake in an eternal and wide left turn. My support stroke kept me upright a few times and I was able to start to think about my paddling technique rather than just remaining dry. I started to get my leading arm higher, and pull the wing out of the water more cleanly and began to feel the boat behave as I wanted it to. I started to focus on the pedalling motion of my legs driving off the foot plate and realised that my knees were pretty much flat in the boat so I headed to the side to adjust my seat position forward. I think it was about then that I capsized for the first time that day.

Adjusting the seat closer to the footrest seemed to make a big difference to how the boat felt, my weight further forward and with my knees bent slightly above the cockpit coaming I found some additional stability and as a result found a bucket load of confidence. Petra*, the name I have given this boat, is a fast boat and I am a prodigious show off so I decided to try and sprint pass my friends. This burst of speed resulted in swim number two, three and was almost certainly a contributing factor in swim number four. My concern at the moment is that it is only a fast boat if I can paddle it quickly, and every time I try that I capsize, which as you can imagine, is an even slower way to kayak.

Next time out I think we will upgrade to canals. If I fall in it isn’t too far to get to a bank unlike the middle of the lake; we can paddle in a straight line instead of endless wide turns, and can start to practice portaging which should be a great deal more enjoyable with the weight of Petra compared to The Surprise.

*I have developed a habit of naming the boats and bikes I am fond of. Is that weird? The old Avoncraft I named The Surprise after a boat in a film, and this new boat is no exception. I also think that names should have a reason and this boat was christened the day we got her. Why Petra? Well Hannah was driving her car as I didn’t have roof bars on mine at the time, and en-route I filled up with petrol, my car is a petrol. We had made it to within approximately eight hundred metres of the collection address when Hannah’s diesel engine started to burn the petrol I had put in and began to cough and splutter. Hence Petra. While we waited for the fuel man to come out we walked to collect the boat and ended up carrying five plus metres of kayak through the heart of London, in the dark, on a Friday night. A memorable start to the relationship with this K1.

The Boat

My 2013 race was an accident really. I used to live in Shropshire which made the logistics an additional hurdle to taking part in the DW but because of work I had moved much closer to the event, I had also joined a Sea Scout group as leader and kayak coach which in turn prompted one of my new neighbours to very kindly give me his old K1 after he saw numerous boats atop my car. The boat was (and still is) in beautiful condition and compared to the general purpose boats I had access to, seemed ideal for a DW attempt. Then at some scout meeting or other I mentioned that I was thinking about doing the DW race in this K1 and before I knew it two other leaders were taking part as well.

The Surprise, then name I gave to the donated K1 after the ageing Man-o-war in Master and Commander, is an Avoncraft something or other. I am guessing she is about 20 years old but I can’t find any references to the boat anywhere. She is a relatively heavy (about 18kgs) but extremely stable (WF easily over 10) boat and was a solid paddle, especially on the Thames section, but a nightmare to portage. I watched with envy as other paddlers zipped past me in modern K1 racing boats, barely a ripple of wake behind them, they would slide up to the portage and leap out with the boat up in the air in one fluid motion before jogging away to the next stretch as though unencumbered. My portage experience involved a lot less jogging and a lot more straining and groaning. There are a lot of portages on the DW! While I am prepared to do the DW again in the Surprise, top of my shopping list was a newer, slippery, gossamer thin K1.

My 2016 DW attempt, much like three years earlier has also been mostly an accident. For the last few years a very good friend and I have been goading each other into taking part in bigger and better events. She is the reason I accidently ran a marathon this year and she is also the reason I am going back to Devizes. Up until a few months ago she hadn’t even been in a kayak, and now between us we have bought three second hand racing boats. (My back garden currently looks like a fledgling kayak racing club).

The most recent addition to the fleet is to be my ride for the race, a green and yellow Popes-Canoe Thruster. It’s a South African boat which on their website is classed as having a Speed of 3, and a Stability of 3. I’m not sure how that translates to the wobble factors used by Marsport and Kirton but even from the photos I could tell the stability would make life interesting. The boat has gas pedals instead of a tiller which I have been using up until now, controlling an over-stern rudder. It is a fantastic looking boat and for the money we paid it is great value.  

Now, I have been kayaking for a while, on and off for nearly 30 years, and even if I do say so myself I am an excellent paddler but this weekend was the first time I unintentionally had to swim a kayak back to shore for a long time.

Sitting in the boat for the first time on my local kayaking lake was a real wake up call, even with my arm resting on the jetty the boat was trying to roll me upside down. I sat for about five minutes trying to maintain some semblance of balance, my arm hovering close to the side to catch the inevitable terminal wobble. I executed my first technical dismount a few moments later having moved zero metres. While I was emptying the boat it was dawning on me that I might not be good enough for this boat and was contemplating dropping the whole thing… But that’s not the attitude, after a few minutes of soul searching I did get back into the boat for round two. I sat there wobbling again for a few minutes but I did find enough balance to pick up my paddle and start to move forward. This time I cleared the jetty before I fell in. Thankfully the sun was shining and I did feel like I had made a bit of progress. Third time out I rediscovered my low brace, was able to save a few near-swims and got the K1 up to a decent speed, only when I attempted to turn around to head back did I fall in... That was a long swim. My last circuit was a success though, it wasn’t pretty but I was able to step out of the boat onto dry land.

I came away a lot less cocky about my abilities, I know I am going to have to put a lot of effort in to master this boat, but I am also sure that I can overcome its instability, and wow it was fast when I was the right way up. I’m glad I am starting this in September because it is going to take some time to get used to but it will be worth it if I am going to try and beat my previous time.

In the beginning

I don’t really remember when I had heard about the Devizes to Westminster race, it just always seemed to be something I had to do. I’m a keen kayaker and I enjoy the big challenges and this race really pushed my buttons. In 2008 I started a blog to chart my progress, my training, and my preparation to take part in the 2010 DW race. I’m not sure why I gave myself two years to get ready but in the end that attempt was never to be, I had lost sight of my original goal and while I had completed a few events and went to the gym a few times none of it really involved a kayak. By February I realised that the blog was experiencing mission creep and I suppose that’s why I wrapped it up… http://dw-race.blogspot.co.uk/ here is the link if you want to catch up bore yourself with it though.

It didn’t end there though. My obsession with the DW didn’t go away and in 2013 I actually took part in and completed the race piloting a K1 with a time of 26:14:49. I was 32 out of the 39 K1’s that finished the race, I have the medal, I had done it.

I always intended to revisit the DW after that. A decent finish time was second to simply finishing the race but I had quietly hoped for a time that was below 24 hours. My preparation and equipment could have been better and I made a few rookie mistakes that slowed me down. So here I am writing a new blog that will hopefully culminate in Westminster on March 28^th next year.