Epic Kayaks
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Summer season, done!
Hi guys!
Tired hellos from training in the south. I have officially made it through a summer season of sprint training. We just completed 3 months of 2 paddles a day, runs, lifts, circuits, and a paddler’s version of what can somewhat be recognized as “soccer.” This is what we do for practice in the event of thunderstorms. It’s just as competitive as any water workout, and it tends to be a hilarious sight for any bystander as they watch a bunch of upperbody-dominant athletes trying to play a foot sport. There tends to be a lot of hand-balls, and I trust any team of skilled 2nd graders would give us a good run.
Anyway, I feel stronger. In past summers, I’ve always committed months of tireless miles to surfski training, but this new sprint/flatwater training makes me feel more versatile, agile, efficient, and stronger as an all-types-of-water paddler. We take multiple sprint workouts and make large workloads for each day which builds both strength and endurance helping both sprint and marathon paddling. I’m hoping it will also help me make huge gains in my ski and I will soon find that out with surfski champs this weekend. I can’t wait to see the ocean!
We had national sprint championships this past weekend which allowed us to see how much our progress has hurt or helped us. I unfortunately felt tired and past my peak at these races. My times have gotten a bit slower than earlier this summer; this seems to be a crude awakening and tough lesson in over training. I think my body is still getting use to the intensity of this new life style, but even if the hard training didn’t benefit me for these nationals, I need to realize that my commitment from the past season will only help me grow stronger for the upcoming years. This sport requires long term commitment, long term gains, and long term planning. I’m patient.
Ahead for this fall, I am extremely excited that I have been awarded the opportunity to compete in Marathon Flatwater Worlds which will be in Singapore in October. I will be competing in a K2 with my partner Anne Blanchard. Marathon trials were last June in North Carolina. Together in our boat, we had an amazing first 18k; then with about 8k to go, one of our rudder cables broke. We finished the race the way most crazy, relentless marathon paddlers would in that situation: by rapping the rudder cable around the heel of a foot, and leaning the boat for buoy turns. It’s exciting how rudder trouble can completely take your mind of the little body aches during a race. It was really fun. Anyway, Marathon Worlds will be my first opportunity representing the USA in flatwater paddling. Our training from here through October will be more marathon focused.
We have about two weeks off now and a month off in the winter, but we are otherwise training year round. Bellow, I’ve attached a clip from a 15k time trial I did last week with two teammates (both of which will also be heading to marathon worlds). You can see me leading with my two teammates on either side of my wake, and our coach following us in a john-boat. I think trading off wake can be an extremely helpful part of training. We practice sprinting when we’re pulling and efficiently resting while on a wake. This will be a huge skill to gain for Singapore.
Tired hellos from training in the south. I have officially made it through a summer season of sprint training. We just completed 3 months of 2 paddles a day, runs, lifts, circuits, and a paddler’s version of what can somewhat be recognized as “soccer.” This is what we do for practice in the event of thunderstorms. It’s just as competitive as any water workout, and it tends to be a hilarious sight for any bystander as they watch a bunch of upperbody-dominant athletes trying to play a foot sport. There tends to be a lot of hand-balls, and I trust any team of skilled 2nd graders would give us a good run.
Anyway, I feel stronger. In past summers, I’ve always committed months of tireless miles to surfski training, but this new sprint/flatwater training makes me feel more versatile, agile, efficient, and stronger as an all-types-of-water paddler. We take multiple sprint workouts and make large workloads for each day which builds both strength and endurance helping both sprint and marathon paddling. I’m hoping it will also help me make huge gains in my ski and I will soon find that out with surfski champs this weekend. I can’t wait to see the ocean!
We had national sprint championships this past weekend which allowed us to see how much our progress has hurt or helped us. I unfortunately felt tired and past my peak at these races. My times have gotten a bit slower than earlier this summer; this seems to be a crude awakening and tough lesson in over training. I think my body is still getting use to the intensity of this new life style, but even if the hard training didn’t benefit me for these nationals, I need to realize that my commitment from the past season will only help me grow stronger for the upcoming years. This sport requires long term commitment, long term gains, and long term planning. I’m patient.
Ahead for this fall, I am extremely excited that I have been awarded the opportunity to compete in Marathon Flatwater Worlds which will be in Singapore in October. I will be competing in a K2 with my partner Anne Blanchard. Marathon trials were last June in North Carolina. Together in our boat, we had an amazing first 18k; then with about 8k to go, one of our rudder cables broke. We finished the race the way most crazy, relentless marathon paddlers would in that situation: by rapping the rudder cable around the heel of a foot, and leaning the boat for buoy turns. It’s exciting how rudder trouble can completely take your mind of the little body aches during a race. It was really fun. Anyway, Marathon Worlds will be my first opportunity representing the USA in flatwater paddling. Our training from here through October will be more marathon focused.
We have about two weeks off now and a month off in the winter, but we are otherwise training year round. Bellow, I’ve attached a clip from a 15k time trial I did last week with two teammates (both of which will also be heading to marathon worlds). You can see me leading with my two teammates on either side of my wake, and our coach following us in a john-boat. I think trading off wake can be an extremely helpful part of training. We practice sprinting when we’re pulling and efficiently resting while on a wake. This will be a huge skill to gain for Singapore.
Friday, July 22, 2011
Hi guys!
Life has been good in the South. I’ve been training down in Georgia for the past three weeks with the Lanier sprint canoe and kayak team. We’re hosting a bunch of races this year which is a lot of fun! My sprint times are finally starting to drop seconds, but it’s a hard-knock life for a surfski-to-sprint paddler.
It tends to be a cool 75 degrees at 6:15am when I walk to the car with a protein bar in one hand and tennis shoes in the other. I tend to be groggy after 8 hours of sleep which isn’t enough to compensate for these high intensity workouts. I’ve been staying with very kind host families down here who are unbelievably welcoming and contain at least one son or daughter who is on the team. Everyone is eager to show that southern hospitality. The orangey sun is usually just coming up as I and the aforementioned son or daughter drive the short distance to the boat house.
The morning workout is always high-intensity, short-sprint work. We usually practice on the 1996 Atlanta Olympic course, which is a convenient 1k warm-up paddle from the boathouse. This gives us extra practice in a course like setting and will hopefully give us even more of an advantage with that whole “home court advantage” thing as we host nationals in August. I’ve been paddling my new Epic Legacy M which I’m in love with. It has a similar feel to the V12… if there is any way for an ICF boat to have a surfski feel. I guess Epic siblings share a lot of genes.
In the mornings, we usually do workouts consisting of 8-10 pieces of any 200m-1000m distances. We frequent a lot of pyramids as well. We favor the early hours of the morning because the motor-boaters do not (although I always enjoyed a little wake/chop). However, the glassy water is pretty nice for a new ICF paddler who is trying to completely change my technique to fit in with all of those flatwater-ers. Hints for anyone going from the surfski world to sprint: straighten your top arm before the catch; don’t let your top hand cross in front of your body; exit quickly; exit closer to the boat; angle your paddle more for the exit; USE THE LEGS; and pause…. Who knew there’s supposed to be a pause in your stroke???
Morning paddles are followed closely by morning runs. These consist of 30-40 minutes of short sprints on a circular track; why not tired the legs out too? This is followed closely by breakfast #1 and breakfast #2, a 2-3h nap, lunches #1 and #2, and then afternoon practice. At this point the temp is at a steady 92ish.
Afternoons usually consist of longer paddles with longer pieces. I value these workouts for a more focused opportunity to work on my new found sprint stroke. These are also often used for team boat practice: another foreign subject to me. It’s an interesting shift going from lone paddles on an icy river in a Maine college town - to workouts in bath water with up to 3 extra people IN MY BOAT. If there is anything to be said on this learning experience it’s timing.... also, sometimes you just have to shut up and paddle. Afternoon paddles are followed closely by afternoon weight circuits; might as well empty out anything else left in the muscles. Then that finally brings us to dinners #1, #2, and #3, maybe a quick movie, and bed.
It’s a crazy day to day life, but I’m so grateful to be doing it. We next have a lake placid regatta in a couple weeks, which should be very telling on how these workouts have either improved us or tired us out too much. I’m planning to continue to do sprint workouts until August, where I’ll switch back to my first love, surfski racing, for August and maybe a few races in the fall. Every time I hop back in a ski it feels like home again. Hope everything’s great up north! I’ve been checking the results each weekend. Drop a line or two back; it’d be great to hear from y’all!
Alex
Life has been good in the South. I’ve been training down in Georgia for the past three weeks with the Lanier sprint canoe and kayak team. We’re hosting a bunch of races this year which is a lot of fun! My sprint times are finally starting to drop seconds, but it’s a hard-knock life for a surfski-to-sprint paddler.
It tends to be a cool 75 degrees at 6:15am when I walk to the car with a protein bar in one hand and tennis shoes in the other. I tend to be groggy after 8 hours of sleep which isn’t enough to compensate for these high intensity workouts. I’ve been staying with very kind host families down here who are unbelievably welcoming and contain at least one son or daughter who is on the team. Everyone is eager to show that southern hospitality. The orangey sun is usually just coming up as I and the aforementioned son or daughter drive the short distance to the boat house.
The morning workout is always high-intensity, short-sprint work. We usually practice on the 1996 Atlanta Olympic course, which is a convenient 1k warm-up paddle from the boathouse. This gives us extra practice in a course like setting and will hopefully give us even more of an advantage with that whole “home court advantage” thing as we host nationals in August. I’ve been paddling my new Epic Legacy M which I’m in love with. It has a similar feel to the V12… if there is any way for an ICF boat to have a surfski feel. I guess Epic siblings share a lot of genes.
In the mornings, we usually do workouts consisting of 8-10 pieces of any 200m-1000m distances. We frequent a lot of pyramids as well. We favor the early hours of the morning because the motor-boaters do not (although I always enjoyed a little wake/chop). However, the glassy water is pretty nice for a new ICF paddler who is trying to completely change my technique to fit in with all of those flatwater-ers. Hints for anyone going from the surfski world to sprint: straighten your top arm before the catch; don’t let your top hand cross in front of your body; exit quickly; exit closer to the boat; angle your paddle more for the exit; USE THE LEGS; and pause…. Who knew there’s supposed to be a pause in your stroke???
Morning paddles are followed closely by morning runs. These consist of 30-40 minutes of short sprints on a circular track; why not tired the legs out too? This is followed closely by breakfast #1 and breakfast #2, a 2-3h nap, lunches #1 and #2, and then afternoon practice. At this point the temp is at a steady 92ish.
Afternoons usually consist of longer paddles with longer pieces. I value these workouts for a more focused opportunity to work on my new found sprint stroke. These are also often used for team boat practice: another foreign subject to me. It’s an interesting shift going from lone paddles on an icy river in a Maine college town - to workouts in bath water with up to 3 extra people IN MY BOAT. If there is anything to be said on this learning experience it’s timing.... also, sometimes you just have to shut up and paddle. Afternoon paddles are followed closely by afternoon weight circuits; might as well empty out anything else left in the muscles. Then that finally brings us to dinners #1, #2, and #3, maybe a quick movie, and bed.
It’s a crazy day to day life, but I’m so grateful to be doing it. We next have a lake placid regatta in a couple weeks, which should be very telling on how these workouts have either improved us or tired us out too much. I’m planning to continue to do sprint workouts until August, where I’ll switch back to my first love, surfski racing, for August and maybe a few races in the fall. Every time I hop back in a ski it feels like home again. Hope everything’s great up north! I’ve been checking the results each weekend. Drop a line or two back; it’d be great to hear from y’all!
Alex
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