Forward Stroke with Greenland Paddle?

Q:  I would like to get the most out of my forward stroke with a Greenland Paddle, but I have been told different things about how to use the GP. Most emphasize torso rotation. Some say it is better not worry too much about rotation, but instead to reach and lean slightly forward, insert the paddle, then pull and sit-up. Some say to take the paddle out at the waist, as with an Euro-paddle. Some say to pull the paddle all the way through the stroke. Is there a style best suited to the GP and a Greenland style boat that gives the most power for the effort?
— Tom in North Carolina

A: Tom, thanks for the question.

Before going into specific techniques, following are some general points to ponder. There is a lot of condensed information here, you may have to read this more than once. Read the rest of this entry »

Best Snapdragon Skirt for Florida Paddling/Rolling

Q: I want a Snapdragon skirt that will be good for Fla paddling and rolling. I want something to seal well. Which Snapdragon do you recommend? I paddle a Force 5 and a rm Chatham 17….Thanks.  Dave

A: Dave,  For full disclosure, I’m a Snapdragon team paddler but I bought Snapdragon before I was sponsored, they make a great product.

I have multiple skirts that I choose depending on my activity/conditions.  The most bombproof skirts are full neoprene, they are dry but also warm (not an advantage in the Florida heat). Read the rest of this entry »

New Q&A Page

In case that “Google” or “Ask Jeeves” isn’t sufficient to answer your kayak question, next time try “Ask Greg”! 😉

You can find my new Ask Greg page among the options at the top of the screen. Please keep it in mind the next time you have a question or want to browse.

I look forward to helping you with any kayaking questions you might have.

What’s the best length for a Greenland Paddle?

Q: I have read different things about how to find the best length for a Greenland paddle and some of the methods result in very different sizes. Is there a traditional method to find the exact paddle size. Thanks! — Confused in Portland

A: Hello “Confused”. Greenland paddle sizing is usually done using anthropometric measurements. This type of measurement takes into account body sizing, and can be done directly, without a tape measure.

For the measurements below, an “armspan” refers to the full reach of your outstretched arms, from the extended fingertips of one hand, to the other.

• The most commonly-used method for touring is one armspan , plus a cubit (the distance from your elbow to your extended fingertips).
• For competition rolling, and kayaking in very windy areas, you may want a slightly shorter paddle — a common length is an armspan plus the distance from your wrist to your fingertips. A shorter paddle is easier to maneuver both underwater and in a strong wind.
• For a very short paddle used with a sliding stroke (often called a “storm paddle”), the length is short  –  one armspan, with the loom only two or three fists wide.

The key is to treat these guidelines as a ballpark estimate ONLY and experiment freely. Your ideal paddle may be several inches longer or shorter than these guidelines  There is no “official/traditional” formula that will be perfect for all users. Don’t get too caught up in what is the “proper” or traditional sizing or what your friends use. By all means try many different sizes but what is important is that the paddle fits you, accommodates the dimensions of your kayak, and the type of paddling that you do.

Paddle length is affected by many things, including your torso height, arm length, kayak width and foredeck volume, height of your seat, and other factors, including your posture and technique.

If your paddle-length is not optimal you will have to compensate with technique, and your posture may be negatively affected.  A good instructor can observe you and quickly determine if  your paddle length looks good and if your posture and technique are sound.

Tip – if you make your own paddle, consider making your first one with the length slightly longer than what you think is “ideal”, and make the loom (paddle shaft) slightly shorter than what you think is “ideal”. This gives you room to experiment. After using the paddle, you can modify it as needed — by taking off some of the length or making the loom longer.  It’s easy to remove wood but not so easy to put it back on!

For additional information please see the sizing information that I posted at Qajaq USA.

K1 First Impressions…

I’m happy to report that my fragile male ego wasn’t bruised too badly, first time in a K1 🙂  At least  I didn’t unintentionally swim but my bracing and sculling skills were heavily tested.  My girlfriend, Pauline Besson, did very well, and managed to stay upright, but did have a capsize or two. Most other friends who tried it went about fifteen feet, the boat flopped to its side, and into the drink they went.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!”

For the first few minutes Pauline stabilized the K1 while I simply got accustomed to the feel.  My first thought was, “You’ve got to be kidding me”!  I was (over) confident that it would be a piece of cake, however the initial stability, or rather the lack of it, was much different to anything I have been in before, and that includes some very narrow V-hulled boats.

I knew the key was to relax,  but  my hip-flexors went into overdrive trying to balance. Nervous waves radiated quickly away from the kayak.  “Stop IT!”, I barked to myself and the quivering boat. After a few minutes I finally relaxed and could balance by using the buoyancy of the paddle and by gently sculling. I used a Greenland paddle for this due to its familiarity, buoyancy and ease of sculling and bracing.

I repeated the same  exercise with a wing paddle.  Finally, Pauline gave the kayak a gentle shove from shore.  The initial feeling is that you are balancing on a knife-edge because you don’t know when, or if, the secondary stability will kick in.  Also, unlike a sea kayak, surf or whitewater kayak, the K1 has no thigh braces, featuring a large open cockpit instead (to allow unencumbered, full leg drive).  I struggled to find something to press against. You simply sit atop a fairly flat seat with no back support, with your feet resting on a comfortably angled footrest and optionally under a pull-bar. The initial sensation is like  stacking a phone book on the back deck of your touring kayak, and sitting on that as you paddle away (not an exaggeration).  Even a surf ski, a true sit-on-top, offers much more contact with the boat, due to the depth of the bucket-seat and leg contact with the “hump” under your knees.

A good solid catch and stroke provides strong support, and is a major key in stability. Unfortunately, while you are first learning how to stabilize the K1, your stroke will be defensive and weak. That’s why it would be best to start in a stable K1 trainer, if available, and work up to less stable boats, so that you don’t add defensive compensations to your stroke. For my first strokes I had to finish each one  in a low brace for stability.

I was determined to get wet, one way or another, so I attempted a roll close to shore. Yes, some people can roll a K1.  I held myself inside the cockpit with an arm wrapped around the hull as I tried to find some way to lock my knees inside the boat. Eventually I simply fell out.  Although not designed for rolling, some K1’s permit limited purchase with your legs near the coaming. I’m sure that with some straps it would not be difficult to roll and at least might save a swim while training.

Pauline is all smiles as she gives the K1 a try.

I find it worthwhile to keep a training log. Following are some excerpts from my first few sessions with the K1 that might be useful to kayakers considering learning a K1, and provoke some memories for those who are proficient.

Session 1

Winter Park chain of lakes. Calm.Took awhile to relax. Waves shooting out from cockpit and boat shaking like a newbie balancing on a taut-line.  Much less stability than I imagined.

Took a few minutes trying to figure out how to best get into kayak from beach. Understern rudder and layup precludes starting on beach. Dock would work but was busy. At this point I just straddled the cockpit and plunked my butt down.  The kayak is deep –learning to get in fast, such as required for marathons will take some practice.
Great feeling of insecurity – feels like you may go over any second. Paddle and brace, paddle and brace.
Tiller steering felt very, very weird. First had to figure which way bar needed to go, but with the footstrap in place there is very little room laterally to move feet!
Roll did not work. Cowboy scramble did not work. There must be something better than swimming the boat to shore.

 Session 2

Started at Winter Park chain, too exposed and windy with small breaking waves on shore, move to Lake Destiny. Windy, small chop but some protected water.
Takes a few moments to get over initial stability.
Kayaked in  protected canal.
Wow, what a leaf catcher – and even the smallest leaf throws up a torrent of water! A bit tenuous when stop and reverse to shed bow leaves.
A bit shaky when turning at the end of the canal, but OK. On lake, getting more comfortable.
Able to link more strokes. Legs/abs/core very tired, very quickly — tried different seat/footrest positions.
Shoulders starting to feel the effect of  all the bracing.
Went to downwind side of lake, amazingly fast downwind, and was lucky to turnaround there without capsizing. Plan was to go around lake at windy side, but waves and wind gusts too much.

 Session 3

Lake Destiny, smooth.
Getting acquainted still.
Landed on sand beach and tried to find a  “fast way” to enter kayak. Didn’t go too well. Kayak is deep,  and once it falls to one side you can’t recover. Incredible that marathon paddlers jump in like getting on a skimboard. Left that for another day.
Paddling farther and faster but still feels pretty precarious. Would not want to try this yet in the backcountry near gators!
Tired quickly – like learning to kayak all over again.

 Session 4

Lake Destiny, calm.
Still takes a few minutes to get over initial stability.
Still getting tired very quickly as core struggles to keep balance.
Practiced leaning hard from one side of kayak to the other, testing the secondary while sculling/bracing with wing.  This helped greatly. First time that actually started to paddle and feel a rhythm. Linking many more strokes and bracing less.
Tiller steering getting better, but feet are awfully cramped. I’d love a full footplate to push all the way down to my heel.

 Session 5

Lake Destiny, calm.
Still takes a few minutes to get accustomed to stability, but now able to link stokes without bracing.  Torso rotation is still slightly impacted due to a “defensive” stroke, but working on taking a full stroke, balancing on the “air stroke” and taking another. Expect to have full-power, full rotation stroke soon.
Paddling is still a workout — hip flexors and stabilizers are still working overtime to balance — so muscles never get a rest — but getting better.

What is needed at this time is simply more”butt time” in the cockpit!

There’s no such thing as a tippy boat…

… Only tippy paddlers.

At least that’s what I used to tell students …. before I tried a K1 sprint kayak.

So why a K1?  I’m working with computers again — great for cash flow and rebuilding bank accounts, but not so great for long trips and expeditions. However the silver lining is that there is plenty of time to train and complete in the local races, grow stronger, and learn some new skills. Also, my interest was piqued by what I have heard about these slender hulls.  Surf the web and you will discover comments such as “the K1 is the formula 1 of the kayaking world”,  “separates the men from the boys” , and “if you can paddle a K1 you can paddle anything!”.   While it’s best to treat what you read on the internet with healthy skepticism, that sounds like a challenge if I ever heard one!

I always find it rewarding to branch out into other aspects  of the diverse world of kayak-sport. Being a “beginner” again in a new discipline is humbling, keeps you grounded and you experience the thrill of rapidly learning and improving. That’s great fun if you have been doing something for years or if you feel your skills have plateaued.

I’m comfortable in 19″ width Greenland skin-on-frame kayaks, a tippy waveski, and train on a balance board. How much more difficult could it be?

As it turns out —  more than I imagined!

Unlike Europe, the K1 scene is not very developed in the states. I have paddled for over 20 years, with many groups and in many disciplines and have only seen a handful of K1’s in that time here. Sprint kayaking is regulated by the International Canoe Federation (ICF). An ICF K1 must be 5.2m (17.06 feet) long and weigh 12kg (26.4 pounds).  The kayaks  are usually built much lighter than this and have precise weight added to meet the requirements.  In 2003 the ICF Congress abolished the minimum beam requirement and designs quickly changed.  The kayak shown here is an “old rules” kayak with “wings” (diamond shape) to satisfy the obsolete beam requirement.

K1 hulls vary in stability, they are given a stability rating from 1 – 10.  At the lowest level are the Olympic sprint kayaks (part your hair the wrong way and you have a problem).  The higher stability ranges overlap with sea kayaks.

I was looking for an Epic Legacy or Nelo Vintage, but the waiting period was long. Fortunately, my good friend Russell Farrow at Sweetwater kayaks had an old K1 that was left behind in Florida after spring training by a European team. South Florida, especially the Pines resort in Melbourne, hosts a number of Olympic hopefuls each year, looking to escape the Winter cold (snowbirds in the local lingo), to train.

The boat is a Bootsbau Berlin K1, year of manufacture unknown. Its condition was a little rough, but after some gelcoat patching and elbow grease it cleaned up pretty good and the hull is sound. I didn’t want to complicate an already challenging process with a leaking kayak!

Coming from a sea kayak background where I prefer a skeg, rather than a rudder, another different aspect to learn is the steering. Unlike “gas-pedal” rudder controls on a surfski, or some sea kayaks, a K1 (usually) employs tiller steering. Paddling barefoot, the idea is to cradle the tiller bar between your feet. You gently nudge the bar right to go right and vice-versa. Although this setup does let you push hard on the footboard without activating the rudder, it takes some getting used to as there is precious little room and your feet are (optionally) secured by a pull-bar or strap.

Tiller steering takes some getting used to. I prefer to push with my heels so will be modifying the footbrace to a full footboard system. I’ll post some pics when done.

So had did the maiden paddle go?  Did it involve some  unintentional “swimming practice” or did I keep the bottom side down?

Please check back soon to find out!

I’ll be including some technique tips in the future as well, including some coaching techniques popularized by the great Imre Kemecsey.

Resolutions….

One of my nagging New Year’s resolutions was to post more often. I’m usually on to the next project/trip without wanting to write about the previous one…

I’m in the process of updating this blog to a new version of WordPress.

During this time the site may be down or incomplete. Please check back soon.

Best,

Greg Stamer