On Balance...

We are into August now and the weather has improved a bit. We've had a couple of really warm days but they occurred when I was unable to take advantage of them on the river. Even so, I've managed a further couple of excursions to the Wey which have produced a bag of rather mixed results. On the first occasion I went with the single purpose of doing something other than short paddles along 'my' quarter mile stretch and exiting the boat to turn it around.

Once on the water I did find a measure of greater confidence paddling in a straight line, and concentrated on getting the boat to go straight. The main problem with this seems to stem from my balance in the boat. The natural instinct is to clutch on to something, and since my hands are already occupied clutching the paddle in a white-knuckle sort of way, and my feet are steadfastly pressed against the footrest, it falls to my knees to get a grip on something... anything. What they do is to press outwards against the cockpit coaming. This is not good. Legs should be relaxed and knees together in the centre. This is supposed to provide a better balance situation as the boat is free to move under your body, whereas when knees/legs have become part of the boat, this effectively blocks the correcting movement and tends to push the boat further into the roll, making it inevitable that you're going to go over.

The tiller for the rudder is situated in the footplate and is supposed to be moved with the toes by pushing in the direction you want to go. So when feet and knees are firmly braced, as they shouldn’t be, to move the tiller requires one of your feet to be lifted off the footboard, and that immediately puts you into what ‘feels’ like an imbalanced situation. Up to now my method each time I come to correct course is to lift foot and quickly kick the tiller, then raise the other foot and kick it back again when the new course is achieved by lifting other foot and kicking it back again.

So... my analysis of the situation tells me that it’s the ‘knee-clutching’ that’s the source of most of the problems I’m having. Hopefully a bit more concentration on that aspect of things and more practice will resolve things. However, if this condition is going to persist I have a ‘Plan B’. I’ve purchased a meter length of Velcro into which Mrs D has sewn a quick release loop. The plan is to loop the Velcro around my knees to hold them together while paddling and in the event of total immersion I can release it quickly just by pulling on the loop. Now I really don’t want to use this method of ‘hobbling’ myself, but if practice doesn’t resolve it, I might have to. I’ll see how things go for a couple of weeks yet. Luckily the Wibbly Wobbly Wey seems to be the ideal spot to practice technique as it’s relatively quiet weather-wise and hopefully not too deep.

At the end of the third stretch I took the bull by the horns and went for a three point turn-round manoeuvre. The river at this point is only about two boat lengths wide, so long sweeping turns are out of the question. The three pointer turned into about a nine-point turn instead, but it was successful. I used the same methodology on each subsequent turn and each time it came off with only a few rock ’n roll moments during the back-paddling. But that was a big confidence boost when it came off and it means more of the time in the session is useful.

Eight months to go...