2004-07-10 Deux Pipe with Sarah Kueffer

The Deux Pipe Canoe Race started and finished at the fishing dock next to Boy Scout Landing on County 210 where the Saint Louis River empties into Lake Superior.  Over twenty canoes and kayaks started at 10AM, paddled downstream to turn around the bridge pylon, back upstream past the fishing dock and past the next bridge, around a plastic milk jug buoy and then back to the fishing dock.  It all took less than 90 minutes for the winning canoes.  It’s always much more fun when you have another team somewhere near your canoe. 

Sarah Kueffer and I started off side by side with Steve Yurista and Dan Hassel, both trying hard to hang onto the stern wake of the six canoes just ahead of us.  Huge shallow-water roller waves followed the flock of canoes and all we could do was hope to stay in the same trough and not fall back any further.  As we came to the bridge pylon, we were on the outside of Steve and Dan’s canoe and I asked Sarah if she wanted to cut behind them.  She said “We’ll see what happens”.  I stayed exactly in sync with Steve’s stroke and kept the bow just far enough away to give him room to paddle as both canoes rounded the pylon.  Coming out of the turn, Steve held his crossbow rudder longer to try and make a sharper turn.  I pulled my crossbow out and paddled on the same side as Sarah to take a wider turn that brought us just inside the bulrush weeds along shore. We ended up a canoe length ahead of Steve and Dan, but we were two canoe lengths back from the lead pack of canoes. 

We stayed close as possible to the weed line to stay out of the main current and to keep them from passing us on the inside.  If they passed us it would have to be by paddling in the faster main current.  They finally pulled up on our side wake as crossed the wide and shallow river near the fishing dock.  I jibed them for riding our wake instead of pulling us by saying that we would help them if they pulled us up to the pack.  I was surprised that they actually did pull up so we could ride them. 

We had crossed the wide river back to make a straight line out of the large bend.  Now they were on the inside next to the weed line and they tried to sprint and drop us, but we were able to hang on.  I focused on paddling smoothly to make it look as easy as possible so they didn’t gain any confidence from working that hard.  I knew Sarah was doing the same thing too.  It wasn’t long before they gave up their sprint and we were still on their side wake.  The teams ahead were slowly pulling further away from us but there weren’t any teams catching us either.

We followed them diagonally across the river again and ended up next to shore with them on the outside.  Even though they had the whole river, they crowded us into the weeds and I had to rudder to keep our canoe from hitting theirs.  That’s when Dan said “GO!” and Steve sprinted to pull ahead of us.  Their plan worked great.  In hindsight, we should have let the canoes bang into each other and paddled same sides until the sprinting stopped.  In that case, both canoes are slowed down, but there weren’t any canoes catching us.  That way, we would have ended up on their side wake instead of their stern wake after the sprint. Of course, the better option would have been to sprint and steer without ruddering and still avoid banging gunnels if you have the skill to do that.  In any case, we had missed a strategic chance and lost a canoe length to their experience. 

Our next mistake was to start talking to the spectators.  Sarah’s mom shouted encouragement from the bridge and then Sarah hollered greetings to Joe and Ann Manns kids on shore.  I wasn’t paying attention and we ended up out in the middle of the river fighting against the faster current.  Steve and Dan had stayed out away from the metal wall near shore and we could have rode our own wake along it to catch or even pass them.   Kenn Ketter had said that Sarah and I shouldn’t paddle together because neither of us would stay focused on racing and he was right. 

Our third mistake was the same as our second one. We spent our energy yelling encouragement at the teams coming back and lost focus on our own critical problem; a long rocky shallow bend before the buoy turn.  Our canoe dogged down and we struggled to make it go.  We finally tried to pop it up by paddling at a faster pace, but Steve and Dan were already popped up on their own wake and pulled even further ahead of us.  By the time we rounded the buoy, they were half a block ahead of us.  That’s when we saw a kayaker and Kevin Shriver and Io Harberts coming upstream.  They had kept within striking distance even though they hadn’t had a canoe wake to ride. 

Sarah and I had decided that we weren’t going to catch Steve and Dan, so we agreed to drop back and paddle with Kevin and Io.  However, we were caught by the kayaker first who rode our stern wake.  Sarah knew him and introduced me to John Abrams.  We told him our plan and he offered to buy us drinks and dinner if we pulled him up to the kayaker ahead of us.  Since we hadn’t gotten to the bridge yet, it looked like we could do that and still drop back to finish with Kevin and Sarah so we agreed to try.  I went back to a more determined pace.  We saw that the kayaker ahead of us was riding on Steve and Dan’s stern wake.  That could be a problem. 

Sarah and I had started talking again and we were interrupted by an impatient kayaker wondering if we were still trying to catch the one ahead.  So I put my head down again and the kayaker eventually dropped off and even stopped paddling to rest which raised our hopes of earning the drinks and dinner.  Then we rounded the final bend to see the finish line fishing dock in the far distance and he regained his determination.  We almost made it, but weren’t quite able to catch the kayaker before he crossed the finish line. 

Another race over and three more lessons learned.   Lesson one; do whatever you have to do to get the inside coming into a 360 degree turn.  Lesson two; when you’re crowded into the shore by another canoe, let the canoes hit and keep sprinting.  Lesson three; stay focused on your immediate challenges and strategic moves.  Even though we had made mistakes, we did have fun and got a great workout on a river.  The swim afterwards was refreshing, the awards ceremony was enjoyable, and we all got a great looking black T-shirt with a smoke pipe and a paddle on it.   Thanks Sarah!