Early morning sessions at Hurley

Now I’m living up near Hurley I often get up early and have Hurley to myself before work. Getting changed is a bit of an effort and it usually takes me at least 10mins to get warmed up but once I’m into it it easily beats sitting in queues of an evening or at weekends. Last week I was up extra early so I took my video camera down. Here’s the footage:

British Championships 2008: Bronze (and a swim)

I’m happy to have taken 3rd place at this weekend’s British Champs. It didn’t start off that well though after I SWAM!!! in the prelims. Luckily it was on my last ride, my deck popped after landing a McNasty (most likely due to the power of it!), I noticed it had gone but went for a loop anyway. It wasn’t the greatest idea, I swam from the Muncher down to where the course re-enters the Trent (thanks to Chris Chapman for rescuing me). I qualified for the Semi’s (top 10) in 4th place. In the Semi’s my first ride was awful; I flushed after less than 10 seconds. The pressure was on my second ride but luckily I put in my best ride of the weekend to qualify for the final 5.

Results:
1st Ed Smith
2nd Alan Ward
3rd Me
4th Ben Brayfield
5th Jon Best

Below is a video of me doing a bit of practise before the competition.

The Mighty Nene Freestyle

This weekend was the Nene Freestyle. The feature for the freestyle was a very sticky pour-over that made it almost impossible to finish of moves like phonic’s and even loops. Saturday was the qualifying for the top 15, I struggled compared to the locals and qualified in eighth position. In the semi’s I paddled a bit better and qualified for the final in first place. The knock final was a great experience and I made it to the final two but was just beaten to first place by last year’s winner James Reeves. Full Results. I did a 2nd place double by coming 2nd in the Boater-Cross too (thanks to the King family for letting me borrow their creak boat).

Photos from Hurley

A few recent photos from Hurley (thanks to Dave Worthley).

European Freestyle Kayaking Championships - Ourense, Spain

At the Europeans each country can provide a maximum of 5 paddles to represent it. This lead to 50 of the top paddlers in Europe lining up for the Mens K1. Out of this lot I finished 18th and was the 2nd highest placest Brit. I also beat all the Irish which was a personal target so overall I was very pleased.

Me concentrating

Spainish kindly decide to actually build the feature

Team Photo

Brits take over the Island by the feature


Lining up for a Back Roundhouse

My Stunt-Double ClaireO

Countdown to the Euro's

Less than 2 weeks to go until I'm off to Spain to represent Great Britain at the European Freestyle Kayaking Championships. I'm in the Mens K1 alongside Pringle, Jon Best, Richard Chrimes and Alan Ward. It's in Ourense in the Galicia region of Spain and no one really knows much about the feature. Not sure where I can realistically expect to come, I only found out I was going last week so I haven't had chance to train. Hopefully I can handle paddling in the heat, rumours are its over 100 degs there at the moment.

Alpkit Tryweryn Leg

Last weekend I headed up to the Tryweryn for the Alpkit challenge. The freestyle competition was held on Saturday on the NRA bridge wave, which is a really good playspot since it was improved a few years ago. In the prelims my first 2 rides were pretty poor but I managed to put in a decent final ride to qualify for the semi's in 5th place. My 2 rides in the semi's weren't very good either as I kept washing out on a frustratingly flushy wave.

I finished 7th in the semi's, not good enough to make the final cut of 5 which was won by Ed.

Saturday also saw the Pyranha Rev Big Move Challenge, the winner being the person who could throw the one-off biggest move in a Rev. I paddled the medium long Rev which felt a bit weird compared to my Jackson but was quite comfortable. To my surprise the Rev McNasty'd on the wave really nicely and I actually managed to stick a couple which was good enough for me to win the competition.

After the BBQ on Saturday night the sumo competition got underway. Not sure if there was an overall winner but it was a good laugh though.

Sunday was a boto cross race down bala mill falls and the rapids leading into it. I only managed to get my hands on a small ammo, which I had to take the footplate out of to get into. My first race was my first time paddling the falls. I came 1st in this race qualifying me for the cup competition. The next race was much harder work and I struggled to keep up in my shorter boat. I came 3rd / 5 meaning I didn't get through to the semi's. At least I didn't end up face sliding the falls like Arron from Square Rock below.

Chertsey Weir

Chertsey can be a really sticky pourover and dishes out plenty of beatings. I love it though and it works all summer long!

The point of Spot X

After having Spot X slagged off to me heres my best effort to over-glorify it showing why I bother with it...

(To be fair I hate it 90% of the time)

The Lunar Orbit to Front Loop Combo move.

A tiny bit of footage from a sunny pots last week

It was a lush day, the sun was out and the level was perfect. I didn't take much film but heres some of the best bits.

Pots when its high

I had a good session at flowerpots today. The Exe was still quite high (10.1), flowerpots was just lower enough to be a hole with shoulders either side. The hole was fairly stable but the current coming down the weir was so quick that it was hard to stick moves. The eddy line gave me a bit of grief but nothing too bad.

The Upper Dart

Tuesday afternoon I had a hour on top wave in a playboat and then met up with big Rupert and crew to do the Upper. There was alot of rain in the morning and the river had come up to a level covering the whole ledge and was just off running through the third arch. I borrowed a creek boat off Rupert, which I was grateful for however.... the seat was totally knackered, there were many spilts in the bottom of the boat, one of which you could see the seat through and the drain plug was a small piece of foam shuffed in the hole. It was fine, I just had to empty the boat every 15mins. Mad mile and Euthanasia were really good fun, although not as technical as when its lower.

Me at the top of Euthanasia (photo Tommy Hatwell)

Rupert at Euthanasia (photo Tommy Hatwell)

A five hour blunt fest at Hurley

On Wednesday me and Will headed up to Hurley for the day. The level was good, a really nice and retentive 3 gates. The sun was out all day and there was no wind making it fairly busy for a week day. We made the most of it paddling from 12 till 3 and then again from 4 till 6.

A crap day at pots - thanks environment agency

On wednesday the Exe was at a level which would usually make flowerpots sweet, however the environment agency had kindly drained the river downstream of pots by opening the flood gate at trews weir. This made the pool level at pots lower which increased the height of the drop making it more vertical and turning the washout into part of the hole.

I decided to give it a go anyway, it was hard work getting out because as well as not having the usual washout the back flow of the stopper was carrying river-right, towards the pit. My tactics were do one move and then try and get out.

Top Wave River Dart 15 Jan 08

60mm of rain since midnight and Tuesday morning the Dart went massive. Will pulled a sicky and me and him were joined by local paddler Nick East on the Wave. Half way through our wave session we decided to run the end of the Upper which also had some nice big waves on it. Top wave never videos very well but heres some footage of the three of us surfing it. The level dropped quickly while we were there so the wave sometimes looks alot smaller.

The Anvil

It had been ages since I last went to Anvil at a decent level but I gave it a go today and found it well good. I thought the weir had started to break up a bit and it wasn't as good these days but I was totally wrong.

New Webcam levels (so I remember)

THESE LEVELS HAVE CHANGED DUE TO THE EA REPAIRING THE WEIR DOWNSTREAM (I THINK LEVELS ARE NOW A BIT HIGHER THAN THEY SAY ON THE GAUGE)
(there's 5 mini bars to the main bars so 7.5 is 8 by my way)


10.1 (culm ave/low flow) - still a hole just but starting to become a wave with shoulders for blunts either side, fast and fun but hard to stick moves

9.3/9.4 (when the culm was doing nothing) - just starting to lap the path by the pub - big and fast but still a hole

8.3 - perfect flowerpots level - nice fairly chunky well formed hole

7.3/7.4 - flowerpots still a well formed hole with a small wave to the surfers right

7.0 - flowerpots a line stopper without the usual washout (to look at anyway)
7.0 - spot x as good as it gets - goes left and right (stay forward on the back end to help keep the next front end back from the pour over), loops never touch the bottom

6.2 - spot x ok - becomes a bit more annoying as the eddy is flushier and shallower and you tend to hit the bottom when trying to come up vertical off loops

5.4 - spot x pretty shit - too shallow for anything expect carefully placed right cartwheels

http://eathorvertonwebcam.org.uk/index2.html

A session at Becky Weir my secret local playspot at a very low level

Today the Dart was really low (a few inchs below the slab/under 4ft) and flowerpots was just too low so I went for a quick session at my local playspot I discovered last year. The level of the Teign was low but there was JUST enough water for the spot to be working. With more water all hole moves go at Becky Weir but at the level it was today any moves involving looping would hit the bottom = right handed cartwheels.

This level was 0.94 on the gauge at Chudleigh (1.43 is its highest level before it becomes too flushy).