Peter’s Paddling Blog

The discussion on safety in Tour de Gudenå has been the main topic discussed among kayakers for the last week. I predict we will see a change of attitude towards safety next year among the race organizers.

Anyhow… The weather Sunday was perfect and we had 70 km of smooth racing. The strongest group containing the leading Spanish Federico Suarez and the Norwegian Eirik Larsen quickly got away.

Far more disturbingly Morten also got away and I only saw him during the two mandatory breaks. The result list hasn’t been published yet so I don’t even know how much he was in front. Not that it matters – even one second is too much.

My rudder control(the T-bar) started getting stuck about halfway through the race making drafting near impossible.

I had arranged that two video cameras tracked the race resulting in hours of video material from the two days. For now we’ve edited a short trailer. Oh and as for the choice of music. Danish sport television has recently popularized the Madonna song for their teasers.

Get the latest Flash Player to see this player.

Publishing videos for the web is depressing. Our original clips are of a much higher quality and takes up 15GB. I’ve dumped a higher quality edition of the video along with some previously unpublished clips at my technical playground.

This weekend I participated in the annual Tour de Gudenå race. The largest kayak&canoe race in Northern Europe with around 900 participants.

As usual my training mate Morten came along and his father acted as our helper. I was in my Supersonic while Morten took his Vanquish.

When we arrived at the launch area in Skanderborg we observed that the wind really was as bad as predicted with a steady force 6 from west. Still everybody acted normal and as no provisions was made to alter the course we got ready for the race as usual.

Eirik Veraas Larsen, the 1000m winner from Athens Olympic Games was sitting next to me as the race was started. He and the leading pack were way ahead in a matter of seconds.

The next 10 km Morten and I took turns leading. The kid was clearly stronger than me on the flat parts while I left him behind when we had waves. I guess the Supersonics slightly better stability compared to the Vanquish helped me.

After one hour we arrived at the 9 km long and 2 km wide Lake Mossø. Immediately upon entering the lake we were slightly sheltered from a spit of land to our left and the conditions were still manageable. Still many decided to stop their race there and then.

Having reached the first spit of land I aimed for the next point 2 km into the wind. This is where the carnage started. Paddling and bracing my way I found a capsized paddler around halfway to the point. There were no rescue boats in sight and I got him back into his kayak and he pumped it dry. However immediately upon letting go of the fellow he capsized again. This time I judged we were now so close to the shore that he could swim and I started the chase for Morten.

Close to the next point I reached Morten and alongside we paddled into the surf zone outside the point. We both capsized within seconds and waded ashore to empty the kayaks. Here we found a group of stranded paddlers from various classes(K1/K2/Trainers).

We didn’t want to quit so carrying the kayaks we ran through the forest to the lee side of the point. Morten helped me into the kayak while a Dutch paddler helped Morten. Morten capsized a couple of times and I figured he would quit so I continued alone.

This time I successfully made it through the surf outside the point and pointing my kayak straight into the wind I continued for half an hour. Tracking the coast was impossible as the waves then would hit me slightly at an angle. The weather was clearly deteriorating with the wind at times approaching a force 7.

A couple of times I considered turning back but rejected the idea as that would put me with the side to the waves. Then after half an hour I came upon a capsized K1-trainer and a very cold looking paddler. I offered to put him back in his kayak but he rejected as he had also lost his paddle.

Again there were no rescue boats in sight so something had to be done. I got the young kayaker into his boat to reduce his loss of heat. He didn’t know how long he had been in the water and was bordering hypothermia. For the next 30 minutes we were clinging to each other’s kayaks as we let the wind take us back to the shore. From time to time the wind carried along cries for help from capsized kayakers.

Back in the forest we met a large group of paddlers. Many had tales to tell of capsizing and prolonged stays in the water. Later I was told of a number of very close calls where people only survived due to pure luck.

Soon it was rumored that the race directors had decided to cancel the race and we all would be allowed to start Sunday morning for the 70 km stretch. At that time I was furious due to the incompetence demonstrated by the racing committee and I considered dropping out all together.

I’m still furious and I am embarrassed for the many foreigners coming to Denmark to participate in this race. I’d like to stress that the racing committee behind TdG does not represent Danish kayak culture’s view on safety.

As for the race Sunday I’ll report on that in a couple of days when my blood has stopped boiling.

Update: A heated discussion is taking place at the discussion forum[Danish] at the Tour de Gudenaa homepage. Boy – the viking rhetorics employed by some of the old giants really leaves me cold.

Update 2: Included map of Lake Mossø.

Sunday it was again time for the 18 km race around the island Thurø organized by the kayak club in Svendborg.
While this race is really designed for the K1-trainer class there is also smaller classes for ICF K1s and sea kayaks.

I had monitored the wind forecast all week as I had to decide whether to go with the Shadow or the Supersonic. Sunday morning I thought the wind looked fine and decided to go with the Supersonic while Morten took his Vanquish.

Well the wind was light alright but the narrow sound outside the kayak club was a boiling inferno with a strong current and endless lines of pestering motor and sailing boats generating waves. Unlike the regular windblown waves at home on the lake this was chaos.

The hosting kayak club.

I believe I wasn’t the only one feeling shit scared as we paddled across the sound to the starting line. Then and there it struck me how completely stupid it was that my Supersonic maiden voyage in the ocean was to be in context of a race.

As for the race itself there’s not much to write on. My brain was for the entire race running in overload mode concentrating on staying in balance. I later heard of numerous capsizes but I only observed one fellow swimming.

One of the hardened race veterans from our club classified the water as the toughest he had ever raced in an ICF racer. We later agreed that completing the race without capsizing wasn’t the least of our kayak accomplishments to date.

Some of the strongest marathon paddlers in the country started in our class and we placed accordingly low. Morten did beat me with 30 seconds though, which made for one hell of an annoying conversation on the trip home!

Was it a mistake to race in the Supersonic? Well I could easily have paddled faster in the Shadow. I was 4 min quicker last year while I’m in a much better shape this year. Still now two days after the race I’m still walking around with a silly smile enjoying the fact that I didn’t capsize.

Kayaking(and canoing I should say) is really living at the mercy of the weather. One month ago at our surf symposium we had dead calm weather. Now at the weekend of the Danish flatwater championship all hell breaks loose with stormy weather resulting in a cancellation of the last competition day.

This clip from Saturday of the C1 Youth 18 1000m finale demonstrates the trouble of paddling a ICF style canoe in a stiff wind. Do notice that paddling a C1 is way way harder than the most tippy K1. No emptying a canoe at the 200m mark is not normal procedure.

Get the latest Flash Player to see this player.

You’ll find a bunch of clips from the other finales here.

My trip with the German paddlers was likewise altered because of the wind. We choose a more sheltered route to avoid being exposed to the North Sea Sunday.
It was a nice and instructive paddle. It’s a bit weird but no questions that the Germans are much more experienced paddling the danish Wadden Sea than any danish paddlers.

Not to beat a dead horse but during the trip I was once again reminded how important strength and power is for safe traveling at the sea, when I was asked to tow a kayaker.
Perhaps one of the numerous sea kayak instruction books should offer advice on how one actually gets fit to paddle a kayak. Dear reader – you got to admit – forward paddling is not exactly given much coverage unlike say how to make a solar still and signal an airplane with a hand mirror…

I’ve put up my photos from the trip here.

[Dull politician with tiny muscles mode on]

Last weekend the Danish Canoe&Kayak Federation held its annual general meeting.

Two things would be of some interest for foreign readers.

1) The EPP system was well received when we presented it for the clubs at the sea kayaking presentation. Speaking of the EPP. The standard will not be released to the public before some technical/political stuff has been taken care of.

2) I had a short but very encouraging meeting on seakayak races with the chairman of the racing board. We agreed to continue the discussion in the beginning of May. We seem to share at least two beliefs. We want a Nordic standard and we want sea kayak races in conditions where it makes sense to be in a seakayak.

[Dull politician with tiny muscles mode off]

Enough on that already.

During the weekend , there was a small kayak exhibition by a couple of dealers. This gave me the chance to see the new Sipre Tsunami, which Erik Arnström already wrote about.

The stylish bow of the Tsunami in the front. The bow of the kayak in back is of the Vajda Ultrasonic belonging to our two marathon danish supergirls.

Øystein(left) and Ravn(right) fondling the Sipre Tsunami. Both belongs to the seakayak board.

I also got a good look at the Sipre Katabatic Master. The dealer said that the Katabatic has the stability of a Struer Tracer while the new Tsunami was in the league of Struer Cleaver(wtf?).

Now I’m not shopping for a new sea kayak but the Katabatic sounds nice. Could even be bought with hatches. No – not connected with the dealer – or any other dealer really.

Now my favorite racer AND home decorator Susanita gave such a nice description of my blog that I better finish with a praise of a female athlete.

Canadian Karen Furneaux

Karen’s message to all the boys and girls out there. Don’t forget your two sets of pushups every morning and every night.