Sticking to the Basics by Andrew Holcombe

Have you ever heard of the book All I Really Need to Know I learned in Kindergarten? The title alone is a great reminder, in my opinion, that we learn a lot of the most important life lessons at a pretty early age. Then we spend the rest of our lives trying to figure out how to apply them to the myriad of circumstances put in front of us. How does this apply to kayaking? Well I’m a firm believer that you learn most of the skills necessary to be a great kayaker in the first year (or maybe if you want to get really crazy in the first month). The trick, and this is what we spend the rest of our kayaking careers on, is figuring out how to use and apply the basics in lots of different and sometimes quite intense situations. The following sequence of photos of Big Boy on the Ravens Fork illustrates this quite well. At first glance Big Boy is a pretty intimidating rapid. However, if you look closer the most important skills sets being used are made up of things we learn on our first couple trips in whitewater: Maintaining an aggressive forward body position and how to punch a diagonal wave or hole.


The key to a successful line here is to punch the left to right diagonal at the top of the picture. To do this I set up angled towards that diagonal with an aggressive (slightly forward) body position.



As I approach the diagonal I keep my body position forward while adjusting my boat angle to hit the diagonal at 90 degrees. This, as we learned early on, will allow me to punch across the diagonal without turning.



Notice that my right paddle blade is in the water to help hold my angle as my boat begins to cross the diagonal.


Completing the right paddle stroke my boat crosses the diagonal with my body weight still forward and angle still at 90 degrees relative to the diagonal.


Success! I’ve crossed the diagonal thus continuing my path from right to left and my body weight is still forward and aggressive.

It’s important to remember that the decision to run a large or difficult rapid is not one to be taken lightly. But, once you do make it its good to remember that you use the same skills you learned early in your kayaking career. The rapids are just bigger, taller, and scarier. So get out there and remember the basics.

False Lips and Delayed Boofs

Scouting waterfalls is a little different than scouting a traditional rapid. Determing a waterfall’s difficulty depends on four factors – the approach, the lip, the height, and the landing. Baby Falls on the Tellico is a good example of an easy waterfall to run. It’s got a fairly easy approach, a 90 degree lip, it’s not too high, and it lands in a pool. Gorilla on the Green is a more difficult waterfall. The approach is through a narrow slot, you paddle over a wave to get to the lip, it’s fairly high, and has a narrow, shallow landing with a hole downstream.

In this video we focus on the second factor, waterfall lips. There are two types of waterfall lips, the traditional lip and the false lip. With the traditional lip water will flow towards the lip and then fall straight down at a ninety degree angle. A traditional lip has one horizon line. A false lip on the other hand has two horizon lines. Water flows towards the first horizon line, slopes off for a bit, and then falls over the actual lip. The key to running a water fall with a false lip is to use a delayed boof stroke (assuming it’s not a really big drop). Don’t throw the boof stroke until after you’ve gone over the first horizon line (the false lip) and reached the true lip.

Whitewater Creeking Instruction: False Lips from Christopher Port on Vimeo.

Look Around

It's usually pretty easy to look at a photo and tell whether the paddler is going to be successful or get worked. It's not always so easy to make it all come together on a river or creek run that's pushing your limits.

Have you ever mentally been here?

"OK, big rapid, I can do this. Big breath. Peel out with left angle for the first drop. Little bit of speed, not too much, now right boof and go! Got to carry my speed, now left boof, turn the corner and accelerate towards the launch pad - big right boof! Look out for the hole, keep my weight forward, and I’m through! Oh man, what a line! That was perfect, I am the best kay….

Wait a minute – where am I? I don’t know where to go, all I see are rocks. Where’s an eddy? There’s one, but I don’t think I’m gonna make it, don’t want to run this backwards. Too late, just close my eyes and hold on, I hope there’s no sieve. Whew made it, that was a close one…"

Sound familiar? If you've spent much time creeking, or even river running, you've likely come through a rapid that you just scouted and suddenly realize that you have no idea what’s down stream. Most of the time things work out, however it does create a lot of unnecessary stress. And unnecessary stress is something we can all agree is not desirable when creeking. So to keep our buddies from laughing while doing the mad hamster scramble at the bottom of a rapid always remember to check downstream for at least these three things

Before you run a rapid:

1. Find a good eddy and make sure you can stop in it. This really serves three purposes. First, it keeps us from running the next section blind. Two, it puts us in a position to set safety for other paddlers. And three, it allows us to pump both fists in celebration for the line we just stomped.
2. Check to see if there are more drops downstream. If there are and you can’t see them in detail, or you can’t see any eddies closer to them, it’s a good idea to walk down there and check it out beforehand. (Remember, just because there’s an eddy above a drop doesn’t mean you should catch that eddy. It’s a bad feeling to catch that last eddy above a drop and realize that you now have no choice but to commit to the rapid. Make sure if you catch an eddy to boat scout you have other options to leave the eddy, besides simply running the rapid)
3. Be aware of your surroundings. Always be scanning for a place where you can get out of your boat, even if there aren’t any more big drops downstream. Why? Because it is your responsibility to run back upstream to help your buddy if he needs it. All this sounds incredibly simple, but in the heat of the moment it’s surprisingly easy to forget to check downstream.

You can also apply a similar method to boat scouting. In my opinion, boat scouting is one of the most important aspects of creeking - primarily because of the time it can save you on the creek. One of the biggest creeking challenges, especially on longer or more remote runs, is the time factor. When done correctly, boat scouting allows you to move quickly downstream and save the bank scouts for when you need them most. To be a good boat scouter, you need good vision.
Here’s some tips on improving vision:

1. Lift your vision. Whenever you’re creeking (and especially boat scouting) you want to avoid getting tunnel vision (only looking at the line right in front of you).Lots of times a line that looks good at the beginning can turn out badly farther downstream.Lifting your vision will allow you to take in the characteristics of the whole river, determine alternate lines, spot hazards, locate eddies, and find safety set-up positions.
2. Always try to look and think at least two moves ahead of where you’re at.
3. Catch lots of eddies. Creeking can seem really fast and often times when you’re starting out it’s difficult to lift your vision and look two moves ahead. By catching lots of eddies you’ll slow everything down and give yourself time to look around from the safety of that eddy. (You can practice looking two moves ahead on your local run, or on a familiar run that you're comfortable with. Practice this on class two/three first, instead of waiting until you get to class five)
   

A word to the wise. Boat scouting is something that is learned over time. Once again, practice on easier runs before you move on to harder ones. Most importantly, always take the time to scout if you can’t see the bottom, can’t see the next eddy, or you feel uncomfortable with the information you have. So go get out on the creek and remember to look around!

Andrew Holcombe Team Dagger NOC Instructor

Andrew will be teaching this years creek week at NOC on March 9-13, 4 days of creeking with all meals, lodging, transportation and equipment included for $900.

For more information or sign up call 888-905-7238

The Boof

We get a lot of questions regarding boofing in our upper-level clinics. I often have a difficult time concisely explaining the boof stroke for the simple reason that there are multiple kinds of boofs, each one requiring a slightly different technique. There are sideways boofs (Cave Rapid, Linville), driving boofs (Sunshine, Green or Seven Foot, Chattooga), rock boofs (Tablesaw, Ocoee or Boof or Consequence, Green), lip boofs (Horns of God, Nantahala Cascades or Tanner’s Launch, Tallulah) or water boofs (Hydro, Watagua or Bear Creek Falls, Cheoah). While each of these boofs is executed slightly different, the underlying principle is the same – the boater is trying to land the boat flat, or somewhat flat, to carry as much of their speed from their approach to their landing, avoid holes or piton rocks, or set up an ensuing move.

Of these boofs, I have always found the water boof to be the most challenging for the fact that the boater doesn’t have a solid rock or lip to help him/her raise the bow. The boater must elevate the bow “unaided” so-to-speak, relying solely on his/her edges, body position, and paddle strokes to accomplish this feat. I define a water boof as any boof that is done without the aid of a rock or well-defined lip. Hence a water boof could be any boof that is done on a sloping rapid before hitting a hole (even Nanthala Falls) or something that looks like a waterfall but has too much water going over it to create a lip that the boater could “grab” onto. The following is one techinque that can be used to execute a successful water boof.

1. Realize that you don’t need a lot of speed on your approach. Many people paddle as fast as possible towards the horizon line only to miss the actual boof stroke because either a) they were going to fast, or b) their stroke timing is off because they’re finishing a forward stroke when the time comes to put in a boof stroke. Some speed is good but concentrate less on speed and more on “waiting” on the boof stroke.

2. As you approach the lip, edge and angle your boat slightly towards the side you will be taking the boof stroke on. For example, if you’re going to take a boof stroke on the left, point your boat slightly to the left and also slightly weight the left edge by pushing down on your left butt-cheek.

3. Sticking with the above example, with the boat edged an angled reach forward to the lip and do a slow forward stroke on the left. The boof stroke is not a choppy, quick stroke – it’s controlled, slow, and deep. (Often times, the forward stroke is just the beginning of the boof stroke. Link a forward stroke into a stern draw for extra power or more precise angling. This is particularly applicable to rock boofs or driving boofs such as Seven Foot on the Chattooga, as shown in the picture)

4. Drive up on the left knee shortly after you plant the stroke and continue to lift the knees as you fall.

5. The boof stroke often causes the paddler to lean back. Be sure to adjust your weight forward again as you’re falling, so as to not land with your weight back in an unstable (and backender-prone) position.

Couple Extra Thoughts
- Lip boofs and water boofs often use this similar technique
- All boofs are different; this techinique doesn’t apply to all of them – it doesn’t even apply to all water boofs
- On sloping rapids with small to medium sized holes I’ve found that taking a slow, verticle stroke earlier than you think and “holding” that stroke throughout the entire move works well.

Creek Week

March is quickly approaching and the promise of spring rains brings with it the anticipated start of the paddling season. In the mountains of Western North Carolina that means the beginning of “Creeking” season. For advanced boaters, nothing captures the essence of kayaking better than paddling on the tight vertical streams that flow after a good rain. The combination of gradient, technical challenge and beauty of the surrounding wilderness bring together the challenge and excitement that defines our sport.

Our NOC Creek Week is designed to give paddlers with Class IV experience the skills necessary for creeking. This year Team D member Andrew Holcombe and NOC Head Instructor Rob Barham will guide you on a creeking adventure and take your paddling skills to the next level.

You can find the details here:

NOC Creek Week

March 11-15

Don't have a full week? Check out our Creek Weekends.