Peter’s Paddling Blog

[Red White Fanboy mode]
The same weekend as we raced the Tour de Gudenaa, the best marathon athletes were competing in Hungary for the World Marathon Championship. While marathon racing isn’t an Olympic discipline, it’s certainly no less interesting.

I’ve eagerly been waiting for Bjørn Olin, the excellent Swedish kayak photographer, to publish his photos from the competition. This has finally happened.

Lolk and Hansen in their Vajda Ultrasonic winning the championship. Photo: essingen.com

After a somewhat disappointing season for the Danish sprint paddlers not qualifying for the Olympics, it was a relief that the Danish Women Senior K2 won the marathon championship again in 2007.

More of Bjørn’s photos from the competition here and my fellow Danes might in particular like his collection of photos of Danish athletes.
[/Red White Fanboy mode]

Update: This is only related in as far as the same model of kayak was involved. Our training Wednesday involved K2 practice in an Ultrasonic even. Sitting behind one of the club’s power horses, the program was just as demanding mentally as physically. It really takes an awful lot of concentration to exactly hit another person’s cadence.

I’m not sure to what degree the notation used in Denmark to describe intensity levels is an international standard. Anyway T0 denotes easy paddling(60 strokes per minute), while T1, T2, T3 and finally T4(110 strokes per minute) are increasingly higher intensity. The core of yesterday’s training involved intervals with 45 seconds T2, 45 seconds T1, 45 seconds T1/T2 and 45 seconds rest.

Sometimes it takes years to carry out a good idea.

Four years ago a mate and I paddled the 20 km to the island Samsø in a force +7 tailwind. To this date it was one of my best kayak surf sessions even though we were paddling loaded sea kayaks. Later we got the idea that in the future, when the wind was right we should paddle to the island and take the ferry back. Super concept but for some reason we never got around to actually do it.

Saturday morning I went to the ferry town of Hov where the Samsø ferry departs from the mainland. Parked the car and launched the Surf Machine in a boring force 3 westerly wind. I knew the wind was way too weak for any real surf action but I was eager do some distance in the kayak and test the logistic of catching a ferry back.

Maintaining an average speed of 7 km/h with my wing I wasn’t slacking. Eirik Veraas Larsen might have been able to maintain 8 km/h but you’re really hitting the hull speed wall hard at 7 km/h. I didn’t surf more than a few times but still it was a nice little trip.

Arriving at Samsø less than three hours after the launch, I carried the kayak onto the ferry and was soon taking back to the mainland. Couldn’t be more comfortable as the surf kayak at 8 kg is an easy one-hand carry.

Next weekend in context of the Danish Canoe Federation, I’m the organizing force behind a surf gettogether at the west coast of Jutland. Here’s the invitation[Danish] for those interested.

No photos this time but a few surf kayak video clips from our weekly monday evening rolling sessions:

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[admin mode]
For some time I’ve been considering how best to handle some of discussions going on in the comment section of the postings. More often than not the discussions contains more interesting information than the (sometimes unrelated) postings that initiated them. However it’s the nature of a blog that comments plays second role to the blog-entries and therefore the discussions tends to disappear.
My first effort to expose interesting comments in old entries was to install the ‘recent comments’ blob in the sidebar. This has clearly worked well. However with discussion threads at times surpassing 20 entries the comment function of the blog is at any rate inadequate.

As a test I’ve installed a forum under the blog and made the most recent forum postings visible in the blog’s sidebar. The Aksimet spam filter guarding this blog’s comment function(currently stopped 46925 spam comments) also guards the forum.
I’ve no ambitions running a high traffic forum nor do I intend to police what belongs in the comments and what belongs in the forum.
[/admin mode]

Ok. Autumn has arrived this very week. Yesterday my hands were for the first time freezing cold after a session on the lake. It’s slowly getting time to switch into an off season training program. This will inevitable result in less time on the water which I expect will be good for my motivation. The thought of not always bringing my paddling gear for work is appealing.

For the time being I’ll downgrade to three k1 sessions and one sea kayak (mostly rolling) session a week. I’ll let the weather decide when it’s time to hit the kayak ergometers again.
Last week we moved into a new office facility. As a result I have a full blown strength training facility 10m from my office door. This is rather practical as I suspect my lack of strength is the main reason I’m not faster. More thoughts on strength and cardio in a later posting.

[lazy politician wasting the paddlers' money on expensive dinners mode]
Last week I represented the canoe federation at a meeting in the Danish Sea Kayak Council. The council consists of eight organizations working with sea kayaks. The main task of the council is to administrate the danish sea kayak educational system, consisting of one personal level and two instructor levels.
Now that the canoe federation are adopting the European educational system(EPP), the council is facing a challenge.. in diplomatic terms. Still I’m sure we’ll be able to work something out.

Sunday I went to Copenhagen for an all day meeting with the board of the canoe federation and the various sub committees(environment, racing, polo etc.). The topic of the meeting was how to implement the visions of the federation in the years to come.

While the meeting itself was rewarding, driving five hours with a member of the racing committee was even more so. We clearly both gained a much deeper insight in each other’s world of kayaking. As they say – communication improves understanding.

All said and done, I’m often struck by the contrast between these dead serious kayak meetings in dull office environments and the fun activities we’re really discussing. I wonder how my childhood(and present day) heroes Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn would react if asked to present a certificate for operating a canoe?
[/lazy politician wasting the paddlers' money on expensive dinners mode]

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.

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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.