Canadian National Marathon Champs

Start of the women’s K1 and C1 race

Jeff and Jim trying to cross the path of the just started women’s K1 and C1 race

Jeff and Jim speed throug a gap to cross the path of the just started women’s K1 and C1 race

Kiran, Clara and Katja approach the portage

Katja completes lap 1 of 3

The leading K2 crews were neck and neck after completing lap 1 of the 3 lap race

Jeff and Jim trying to save some energy by riding wash off Jordan and Elliot

“Hey woow!!! Stay straight please…let me know if you are going to turn like that!”

Time to get the boat moving again after the brief pause

Jeff and Jim work on getting back in stroke as the crews pass under the bridge

Jeff and Jim settled in nicely on the right slip of Jordan and Elliot’s K2

The FLCC and BCKC K2’s head downstream to the turning buoy

Josh and Colton taking a fast line downstream

Jeff and Jim move offshore to round a dead tree blocking their path

Jordan and Elliot taking the direct route upstream

Jeff and Jim paddling upstream out of the strongest current

Jordan and Elliot taking a mid-current line heading upstream

Jordan and Elliot passing under the bridge

Jeff and Jim sneak ahead of Jordan and Elliot to start the second portage

Katja passes under the bridge

Kiran expertly guiding her K1 through the current

Katja seeking the fastest current in the middle of the river

Katja negotiating the boils in the current

Katja steals a drink while prepare to lug her K1 up the hill

Kiran showing fine form as she starts out on her 3rd and final lap

After 2 hours of racing it came down to a sprint finish

FLCC’s Jordan and Elliot take the sprint finish over BCKC’s Jeff and Jim

Jordan and Elliot shortly after winning the race

Jeff and Jim looking happy to be finished

Josh and Colton finish 3rd (2nd junior)

Kiran finishing 1st

Katja finishing 2nd (1st senior)

Clara finishing 3rd (2nd junior)

Start of the men’s K1 and women’s K2 race

K1’s and K2 sprint off the line at the start

K1’s and K2 jockey for position shortly after the start

Men’s K1 of a women’s K2 head downstream for the first turn

Lead pack heading upstream to the first portage

FLCC’s Jordan and Josh making it look easy

Mike, Ken, Ian, Jordan and Josh head upstream to the first portage

Elliot about to pass under the bridge

Jordan leads Josh upstream under the bridge

Men’s C-1 race starts just as the kayaks cross the channel

Keith after a long hard race on the Shuswap

This past weekend Enderby (near Vernon) hosted the Canadian National Marathon championships which took place on the scenic Shuswap River. This type of physically and technically challenging racing may not be of interest to many of our local surfski community but it is worth writing about the event here if for no other reason than to educate ourselves about another paddlesports racing discipline compatible with surfski skills. So what is marathon canoe and kayak racing? Well, in a nutshell, it is races that range anywhere in distance from say 10 to 40 km, depending on the age, gender and boat type and take place usually on lakes and/or rivers and that include portages…yes, you have to get out of your boat and carry it over land to the next put in location. In North America this type of racing is most popular with canoeists…the kind that has the paddlers sitting, not the high kneel sprinting type canoes you may have seen in the Olympics. But in much of Europe there are huge numbers of paddlers who race these marathon events, even the high kneel canoeists do it. The South Africans have developed their own version of marathon kayaking where they paddle sprint type kayaks modified with over stern rudders, those are the rudders that hang of the back of the kayak like you see on most sea kayaks, not underneath, then race them down the gnarliest rivers they can find…and they have some dusies (pun intended), but that would be an entirely different story.

The Enderby event began on Friday with mixed doubles canoe events…I didn’t see this race so won’t comment other than to say that a certain husband and wife team from Saskatchewan (Mike and Fiona Vincent) did a number on the field again this year. Saturday racing was men’s K2, men’s C2, women’s K1 and women’s C1. For those of you who know the difference, there were no high kneel canoeists at the event so C2 and C1 refer to the proboat style marathon canoes. The course for this race was quite confusing and no amount of verbage will do justice to the intricacies and details of the various aspects of the course and how to effectively guide a kayak/canoe along it. I’ll see if I can post a decent picture…but no promises. Basically the section of river below the bridge, which is just downstream of the start/finish area, not line, area, is about 100 feet wide and fairly docile with only some boils to contend with. Upstream of the bridge the river is divided as it weaves around some islands with the main channel being about twice the size of the smaller channels. During the upstream legs we mainly traversed the smaller channels and the downstream leg was confined only to the main channel. The distance of each lap was estimated at about 8.5 km. So under cloudless sunny skies the 3 men’s K2 crews started their race at 9:30 Saturday morning. To start a marathon race in a river the officials had us paddle up past the ’start line’ then on command we drifted along without paddling in as close to an even line as we could muster…then the official would holler “GO” and off we went. The 3 K2’s shot off down the river passing under the bridge which was crowded with spectators, proceeding downstream for about 750m before making the turn around a big yellow buoy then it was back upstream. All 3 boats arrived together and made the turn without incident. One of the critical aspects to marathon racing is to go as fast as you need to go while conserving as much energy as possible. So on a river basically you want to stay in the fastest current on the downstream legs and try to stay in the least current on the upstream legs…pretty simple right? In practise it becomes somewhat more complicated, of course, when you factor in river direction changes, eddy lines, turbulent boils, shallow water (sand bars), subsurface debris, shoreline vegetation and other boats. It was at this first turn that the young crew from Fort Langley Canoe Club (Josh and Colton) found out that their rudder had a problem, the wing nut had loosened to the point that they had no rudder control…so they paddled essentially rudderless upstream to the portage where it was quickly tightened. After paddling upstream to just past the bridge we landed at the shore, quickly exited the boat, picked it up and ran up the short hill and along the grassy park then back down a different hill to the river and got back in the kayak. Along this first portage Jim and I ran past the leading FLCC crew and were first back into the water. From here the course would take us across the river, and slightly downstream, to a side channel that we were to paddle up. Unfortunately just as we were crossing the channel the women’s K1/C1 race had just got underway and they were flying downstream along the path we need to cross. After sitting in the current for what seemed an eternity both K2’s managed to slip between boats to get across the main channel and we continued our race heading upstream. To help form the picture in your head of where we were now heading, if facing upriver the portage had taken place on the right side while the smaller channel we were now traveling along flowed into the main channel from the opposite bank. The channel was about 30-40 feet wide and still had a noticable current so Jim and I stayed as close to shore as possible crossing the channel as the river direction changed to try to stay in the least current. After a while the small channel reconnected briefly with the main channel divided only by some posts and debris. Staying to the left we avoided the strongest current as we made our way by some trees/bushes that required manuevering into the current in order to get past. The trick to this seemed to be to stay in the back eddy downstream of the obstacle as long as possible, then at the last second turn the bow into the current, then quickly turn left again before the current could catch too much of the boat causing it to travel farther than necessary into the current. Once past the obastacle it was back in tight to shore to maximize the boat’s speed. At one point the posts may have been a fence as they continued across the channel to the left shore, so we had to pass between them to continue upstream. These posts were spaced out about 6 feet apart but had some funky currents, there was another channel coming from the left just above the posts so there was a back eddy just upstream of the posts, so just as our bow past the post line the boat would scoot to the left so it was good to leave bit of space to allow for this. The downstream entrance to this new channel was shallow which resulted in faster water flow…we found that by stay close to left shore our rudder would just clear the shallow shelf allowing us to avoid the worst of the current…but it didn’t take much to get this wrong then the bow would quickly swing to the right and we would have to paddle hard to make progress against the strong current. After about 500m this channel lead back to the main channel, with a log jam marking the upstream entrance of the smaller channel. The current in the main channel was significantly faster and very shortly after entering the main channel we crossed to the other side in order to be on the slower current side of the turning river. Unfortunately the upstream half of the corner was a shallow sand bar and there didn’t seem to be any way of avoiding paddling through this section. It was here that Jim and I first realized that we may be at a disadvantage to Jordan and Elliot…you see together we probably weigh about 50 pounds more than the FLCC lightweights…as Jim and I started to tire we found it more and more difficult to keep up with the guys when passing over shallower water. Fortunately once the water got deeper again we were able to better take advantage of staying tight to shore to avoid the current to close up the gap then we accelerated on the second channel crossing to pull ahead again. After rounding the next bend the upstream turn was in view. Here we found the next disadvantage, the FLCC K2 would turn way better than did ours…at each turn they would gain about 3 boat lengths advantage…which meant we had to waste energy picking up our pace to catch back up after each turn. On the downstream leg we rode wash staying together for the duration of the run downriver. After rounding the downstream turning buoy Jim and I managed to make it to the portage take out first by taking a line tight to shore enabling us to stay out of the current. Hitting the water still in the lead we were once again delayed on the channel crossing, this time some of the men’s C2 crews were passing by downstream…this time the other crew made it through the delay ahead of us. Now back in the small channel we worked on closing the gap, but it took more work than we’d hoped…we thought maybe we had picked up some weeds, more likely we were getting tired. We finally caught back up shortly before entering the main channel at the upstream end of the loop…but to stay on their stern it felt like we were working way too hard…I thought we needed to try something different, so as Jordan and Elliot started their way across the channel I made the decision to stay along the left shore, thinking maybe we could stay out of the current then cross the channel at a point upstream of the shallows, unfortunately after this manuever shook out we found ourselves about 50 feet behind…sorry Jim…sometimes my gambles work, sometimes they don’t. So there was nothing left to do but try to real them in. On the downstream leg we didn’t make up any ground so we hoped to be able to do a better job at staying out of the current on the upstream leg of the 3rd and final lap. Unfortunately for us the guys did a great job of learning our faster upstream lines…they didn’t put a paddle wrong the entire run back upriver. We did manage to catch up just before the top end but it took a hard steady effort to do so. And then at the corner they did another great turn making us work hard again to catch them…so when we caught them we sat on their left slip to try to rest up for the finish. I tried to get into their head a bit by talking about how this is such a beautiful place to race that it would’ve been nice to be able to do a 4th lap…unfortunately it got more of a reaction from my partner instead of our competition…oops. A critical moment came about 750 m from the finish…just before the last bend leading to the finish there is a bit of an S-curve in the river where we paddle through a shallow sand bar, then usually move to river center or more right to avoid a nasty eddy on the next corner. Since we were sitting on their left slip they got to chose the line we took, not sure if they planned it, I suspect not, but as we crossed the current line our K2 turned sharply left as the eddy took us in toward shore…with the rudder cranked for a right turn it took a while before the eddy let us head back downstream…the guys hit the gas when the saw our sudden course change. Once back on track we sprinted to close the gap…unfortunately just as we pull along side it was time to sprint for the finish line…Jordan and Elliot quickly pulled ahead…we made a final last gasp attempt to pull past but came up short. Jordan and Elliot paddled a fantastic race…it was so cool to see them learn the faster upstream lines then use them against us…they were well deserving of the win…congratulations guys!

Ugh, but now we had to do it all again on Sunday, this time in K1’s while Kiran and Katja joined us in K2. Sunday’s temperatures were even hotter, hydration was going to be important. Our field was bigger for this race, along with the 8 kayakers who raced on Saturday, we were joined by Ian, Mike V., Ken, Paul, Alex, Keith, Mike v M. and Bob (S1X surfski). Ian was just back from racing last weekend’s world cup marathon kayak race in Portugal. The start went well and fast, not surprising considering all the sprint racers in the field. By the bridge most of the field was ahead of me but since there was still 2 hours of racing to go there was no need to be concerned. A big group had formed at the front, looked like everyone was watching Ian. The downstream turn went fairly well, saw a couple of the lead paddlers get tangled slightly but no one fell in. Thanks to Katja and Kiran for easing off slightly as we rounded the turn to avoid a collision. The first portage went fairly well, there was a bit of a delay getting back in the water, young Josh, who had been up with the leaders, looked to have fallen in as he was standing in water up to his chest as I looked for a place to launch. Once in the smaller channel heading upstream the large pack had reformed at the front, seems Ian slowed the pace to allow the group to reform. I was a short ways back with Alex and Josh but we had the lead pack in sight. Alex did a great job selecting good lines upriver so I followed patiently trying to stay relaxed with Josh sitting on my side or stern wash as opportunity arose. When we rejoined the main channel near the top end of the course both Alex and Josh angled into the current early…I took the opportunity to try to shake them…I stayed to the left out of the current for a few more seconds then accelerated hard on the channel crossing…just at the corner I caught Elliot who had dropped back from the lead pack, he then got out of his boat at the apex of the turn, looked like he was emptying water from his boat. Up ahead Jim and Paul had also come unhitched from the lead pack. After sneaking up the right shore I then accelerated again during the crossing to the left shore…this tactic proved quite useful at making up time on the others and seemed to be a good psychological approach too, work hard when crossing the current then try to relax and concentrate on good lines while working the eddies along the shoreline to avoid the current. Shortly after the upstream buoy I passed Jim then moved onto Paul’s right slip. After resting for a minute I could see the lead pack only 100 feet or so ahead…I made the decision to try to catch them on the downstream leg so I accelerated away from Paul. I managed to cut the gap in half but couldn’t quite catch the group that now consisted of Ian, Mike V., Jordan, Ken and Bob. At the 2nd portage I arrived just behind Ken and Bob who had fallen slightly behind the leading trio. During the run I passed both Ken and Bob, by the time we started back up the small channel only Bob was following close at my stern. Like me, Bob did a very difficult race on Saturday, he placed 2nd in a hard fought C2 race, so I figured he might also be feeling the effects of the previous day’s racing…hopefully more than I was. In the small channel just before we rejoined the upper main channel I heard the crash of Bob’s paddle hitting some overhanging branches that we had to negotiate…thinking this distraction would cause Bob to pause or to move out into the current I took the opportunity to hit the gas and fortunately opened up a couple boat length advantage. Knowing Bob would be chasing hard, when we entered the main channel I accelerated hard again during the crossing…this worked in opening a bigger gap which I was able to hold to the upstream turn. I now turned my attention back to the leaders who were now about 100 feet clear. Despite my attempts to make up ground by cutting the corners, which seemed to work a bit, I wasn’t able to get much closer to the leaders by the end of lap 2. The leading trio became a duo as Jordan’s race was only 2 laps…so he finished first in the junior category, while Ian and Mike continued on for a 3rd lap. At the end of lap 2 we didn’t do a 3rd portage, instead racers were required to round a small grassy island just in front of the finish area before crossing over to the small channel. After entering the small channel I consumed that last of my gatorade and set out to conserve my 3rd place position. I figured the only chance I had to catch Mike was if Ian were to drop him early but that is not how it worked out. Besides I was getting real tired…I wasn’t so worried about not having the energy to complete the distance, I was more concerned about making a technical error in the current that would have me fall in. So I continued the same approach, stayed relaxed while picking efficient upstream lines and picked up the pace while crossing the channels. Everything went well and was perhaps helped by catching some of the women’s C2 crews which helped keep the mind occupied. On approach to the upstream turning buoy Ian was now heading downstream alone, Mike was now about 50 feet behind and looked to be satisfied with 2nd place. The downstream run went well enough, just concentrated on good paddling technique tried to relax in the boils and avoided the nasty eddies. Bob finished in 4th with Alex and Paul coming in 5th and 6th, cannot remember which order. Then I think came Ken, Kiran/Katja, Keith and Mike v M. I’ll post the full results when they become available.

Marathon kayak racing certainly is a unique paddlesport, it definitely tests many skills: stamina, speed, boat handling, pack racing tactics, portaging. This season I was fortunate to do 4 marathon kayak races: the April 30th 30 km race at Victoria, the May 10th 20 km race at Fort Langley and now these two 25 km races at Enderby. Although these races were all brutally challenging I hope these events continue and that other similar events will be organized. More and more of our local surfski racers are discovering the benefits of also training in K1…maybe some of these new K1 paddlers will soon discover marathon kayak racing…it certainly has my attention.