Author Archives: Bob

No matter

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.. What the weather is doing, with only 12 weeks to go, I just have to pick which ever day the weather report tells me is going to be the best.

This weekend the reports were not the best, but Saturday looked better than Sunday, so a quick check of the tides, along with the predicted and observed windspeed/direction and I choose a time and course to paddle.  The predicted wind of 20-25km/h was not quite right, it got up to around 30-35km/h.

The best of the bad conditions.

With the wind from the North-West, and having about 15 minutes of outgoing tide, I made the choice to head out of Angus Inlet, around into Barker Inlet towards the Port River. As soon as I rounded into Barker Inlet the wind started!  Not too bad – going with the last of the outflow, I was protected somewhat and the wind was a gentle 10-15km. From here, things started to get worse, a lot worse!

As I went under the bridge I was suddenly copping the lot of the wind right in my face. As I rounded into the Port River I was hit with he full force of 30+km/h wind, and it is clear to see the effect on the graph below (around the 4km mark). It was a hard slog down the river, as not only did I have the wind in my face, but the tide had turned and was flowing in as well.  It got worse, much worse!  I had no choice but to stay out of the channel of the river and in the shallows as the river was very busy – with the Port River Sailing Club out racing in the river.  Then, just to make things harder again, the tug boats started moving on the river.

So, here I am, with a 30+ km/h wind in my face, incoming tide, paddling in less than 2M of water, with a nice wind chop of up to 0.5M when a tug boat comes up the river.  Yep, a “nice” 1M+ wake on top of it all was pretty messy, look at the plot, you can see where my speed dropped right off – I was trying to stay upright as the tug boat went past, the wake was almost washing me backwards!

I had to wait a little while to pick a break in the river traffic to scoot across to the other side for my trip back up the river – look at the plot around the 8km mark when I turned.  Now with the wind and the tide at my back.  The wind was not as much assistance on this side of the river as it is a little bit more protected.

As I passed the entrance to Barker Inlet, I hit the start/finish line of the sailing, and continued down past all of the yachts before I turned in front of the Rowing Club back across the river and a short, final hard workout into the wind.

Once I got back out of the Port River (around the 15km mark), I had another bit of reprieve, shelter from the wind (well a slight tail wind)  and the incoming tide assisting me.  Now, out of the chop and boat traffic I had a pretty good run until I copped the wind in the face for the last 800m back across Angus Inlet to the boat ramp.

Speed Plot – It really was tough into the wind and against the tide

  • Distance: 18.5km
  • Time: 2:36:42
  • Avg Moving Speed: 7.1km/h
  • Tide: 0.6 Low / 2.6 High
  • NW Wind up to 35km/h

This is by far the worst conditions I have been out in for a long time, and even though I only averaged 7.1km/h I was pretty pleased!

I was paddling with my new lighter paddle and in such conditions, I didn’t really notice if it was any easier.  What I did notice is that the shaft of my new paddle is about 1 or 2mm thinner than my other paddle – so it feels a bit different in my hands.

PS – I was glad I picked Saturday, as Sunday was even worse – much more wind and a fair bit of rain as well.

230 grams

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It might not sound like much, but let me put this all together.

My Current paddle comes in at about 1.25kg.  Over the 112km, I will be putting that paddle into the water around 45,000 times.

Today, My new paddle arrived and it weighs just 1.03kg or a whole 230g less.  When you do the sums, 0.23kg x45,000 = 10,350kg less weight I will have to lift, so yeah, 230g is a significant difference.  I will have to wait a few days to try it out and see what sort of difference it really is.

When I got my last paddle, I did make a sacrifice on the weight – as I bought a split shaft paddle.  I really had no choice as I wanted to spend time getting the length and offset right, and once I sorted that out, I simply got one made to suit me in my boat.

How fast?

Last weekend I did a few counts of my stroke rate and both times, (over 6 minutes) it came in at around 60 strokes/minute.  Now I am going to be swinging a paddle that is 20% lighter, i wonder if this might just increase a little -and give me a bit of a boost in my speed.

Other exercises

I used to have a real problem with getting pain in my arms after the first 5km and it usually took the next 5-6 before it settled down.  So, what I did was grab a couple of 1.5Kg dumbbell’s and when sitting on the lounge watching TV, just grab them and just do a tiny bit of work.  Over the course of about 2 months, I found that i was no longer getting the pains in the arms.

The idea was not to go too heavy and “bulk-up” the arms, but more about picking a weight that is just a bit heavier than my paddle (well, just over double if you add them both together), and put together a range of exercises to just work the specific muscle groups a bit.  While I would have liked to find something around the length of my grip on a paddle that weighed in at around the 3-4kg mark, to keep the arms in a paddling position, I just couldn’t find something, so the dumbbell’s did the trick.

The main way that I use the weights to work my arms is to hold my arms out to each side, bend the elbows so that my hands are straight up.  From here, I do slow movements one at a time by bringing my hands down to horizontal both out to the sides and down to the front, over about a 2-3 second period for each movement.

How much? well that is easy!  Each commercial break on an hour long TV show is about the right time!  Whenever an ad break starts, pick up the weights and work the arms then rest while the program is on.  Doing this most week nights for  as long as you are sitting, watching the TV will go a long way to getting you paddle-ready when you cannot get out and actually paddle.

More Training

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Today, the tides were not as kind as they have been, but that does not matter – the HCC is in a tidal river – and I will have at least 1 incoming tide to contend with – which is about 5 hours.  So, getting a day where I have to work against the tide is a good thing!  With the tide against me whichever way I went, I decided on a clockwise run around Torrens Island as the tide was well over 1M, it meant I could get thru the cutting at the northern end of the island.  As the circuit is only about 17km, I decided to tack on a couple of extra loops to bring me up over 20km. It was still pretty cold with the max temp only about 13 or 14, but at least I managed to miss the rain.

Mixing it up and taking a different route.

As usual, I started off at the boat ramp, headed out of Angus Inlet around into Barker Inlet, then up the Port River a little bit, before turning and going back down the river to the cutting across to Barker Inlet again.  Here I headed down and did a loop around No 1 Channel Marker then back up Barker Inlet, into Angus Inlet and the Boat ramp. The high tide was at Midday and I started out around 11:15, so I was paddling against the outgoing tide until I turned and headed back down the Port River.  There was about a 15-20km/h southerly wind, which I had at my back, down the river – the rest of the time it was in my face.  With the wind, it was a bit messy with a wind-chop up to around 0.3 – 0.5M.  When I hit the cutting to go across to Barker Inlet, I also hit a brick wall with the tide – it runs pretty hard thru the cutting. Once I started back down Barker Inlet I had everything against me – the wind in my face and an outgoing tide – and it did slow me down a little.

Speed plot from GPS

  • Distance: 20.5km
  • Time: 2:40:54
  • Avg Moving Speed: 7.7km/h
  • Tide:  1.9 High / 1.0 Low

I quite often paddle from the boat ramp out into Barker Inlet and down to the No 1 Marker and back when I want to do a short (15.6km) paddle.  As far as time goes, it is usually about 52 minutes with the tide and about 65 minutes against the tide.  Today, against the tide and against the wind, I came back up the Inlet in 61 minutes – so I am pretty happy with that.  While the tidal flow is not very strong here, it is very similar to the Hawksbury – so I like to paddle against it when I can. At this stage of my preparation I am quite happy with how I am traveling.  I am up around the 20km mark and still feeling pretty good at the end.  In the next week or so, I will have to start pushing the time/distance up a little more.

Only 14 Weeks to go….

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I have added a countdown timer to remind me of how little training time I have until the Classic.

Yes, It is true, there is only 14 weeks to go before the 2012 HCC.

On friday afternoon, I checked the weather report and tides on the BOM website.  Sunday looked to be the best day, weather wise, so then a quick look at the tide so I could decide on the best time/place to paddle to.

Today’s paddle took me from the boat ramp in Angus Inlet, out into Barker Inlet (outgoing tide providing a bit of flow for me),  when I hit the Port River, turned right and went all the way up to Bower Road, which separates the River from West Lakes.  Once I get to Bower Road, I turned around and headed back.

Very little wind, maybe up to 10km/h so the effect was almost non-existent on my paddling today.

Paddle on 20120722 from Garden Island Boat ramp to Bower Road and Return

  • Distance  19.2km
  • Time 2:27:20
  • Avg Moving Speed 8km/h
  • Tide: 0.6 Low / 2.2 High
The tide was at a low around 1.5hours after I started.

Speed and distance profile

The Garmin Basecamp Software lets me see a profile plot of my speed and the distance, and in the software itself it is interactive – I can move the mouse along the plot and see on the map where I was at the time.  The plot shows me a lot – the tidal influence on the first 3km was far stronger than I realized while out paddling – and it was really the only time that there was any significant assistance.  The rest of the time, whilst I was padding both with and against the tide, the flow was nowhere near as strong as that section.

Today was one of the best days I have ever had on the river – there were dolphins everywhere!  I saw at least 30 of them today, where usually, I might only see up to 6 or so.  A couple of times, I had them swim towards me, then swim with me for a minute or so – swimming on their side just off to one side of the boat about a metre deep, just looking at me.

The path I took today is one of my benchmark paddles that I do.  I like to keep a bit of a track of how long it takes me to complete. Today, was the fastest ever time I have done, and the first time for me to crack 2h 30m.  The last 2 times I have done it my time was 2h 31m.  When I was paddling my plastic boat, my target was always to complete the 19km in under 3hours!

Now I just need to keep up the training, mix it up and supplement it a little with some cardio work and as soon as it starts warming up a little, ramp up the distance I am paddling by 5-10km.