2004-04-12 RR KC 2 - Paddling with an upcoming rival

Eight C1s and two tandem racing canoes met at the Rum River at 5PM after fighting particularly slow rush hour traffic across the bridge over the Mississippi River in Anoka.  Kjell Peterson, Todd Ellison, Deighen Blakely, John Davies, Ed Arenz, Todd R. Johnson, Eric Canny, and Jason Larsen all paddled C1 solo racing canoes.  Some were woodstrip and some were made of Kevlar.  Kjell’s C1 was a Dan Cruiser designed woodstrip with 4 inch horizontal fins flush with the waterline, making it look some kind of spaceship.

Keith Canny, current patriarch and respected member of the Minnesota Canoe Racing Council of Elders, agreed to paddle with me since his usual racing partner was out of town on vacation.  I would be paddling against Keith and Doug Berg in the upcoming May 1^st Snake River Canoe Race with the guy Keith’s been training for the past two seasons, Lee Jarpey.  We would be using aluminum canoes, which will be like paddling barges for 2 hours.  Today, we used Keith’s V1-A racing canoe which is a bit wider than a normal V1 racer.  According to Keith, V1-A’s are harder to pop-up in the shallows and harder to keep up once they are riding on their own wave in water less than a foot deep.  RoseAnne Barr & Stephanie Larsen were paddling the other tandem racer.  Keith and I grounded twice on shallow sandbars, having to get out and pull the canoe forward and scramble back in again.

After the first sprint, Keith said I needed a lot of work on my shallow water paddling.  He asked me how to make the canoe go fast in shallows and I didn’t know what to say.   Instead of increasing the frequency of my strokes right away, Keith said to take about 5 really long, gut-wrenching slow strokes to get the canoe up to speed before paddling faster to keep the canoe going faster.  It was just like at the start of the canoe race when the canoe started at zero velocity and had to be brought up to speed.

The 8 solo racers flocked upstream on the sunny side of the river like a flock of mergansers chasing minnows.  While the 2 tandem racers stayed out in the deeper water to fight the faster current and sucky water.  The upstream run spread out the canoes, as it usually does.  However, on the downstream run coming back from the sandbar island, the canoes stayed side by side most of the way back.  Occasional sprints broke the formation and then the winners would slow up and let the line reform so we could ride each others wakes. We saw several pairs of ducks and pairs of geese with the maple leave still just coming out.  No gloves needed with temperature in the 60’s.  A lone red cardinal whistled at the setting sun from the top branch of the tallest tree on shore.