Hi fellow paddlers, I can't believe the hipe about paddles that is going on. Last year I attended a session on a beach where one of the countries top Marathon coaches was talking about paddling efficiently. One thing he said was that the paddle does not actually move through the water, it is very much like having a long series of posts set in concrete under the water - you reach forward with your left hand and pull yourself and kayak forward, then reach forward with the right hand and pull forward again. If he is right, and next time you are out paddling along at a reasonable speed put your paddle in next to a stationary floating object - you will see that it does barely move more than a inch or so. So if he is right, then it logically follows that the shape is irrelevant - all you need is some area of blade that will not move through the water. Maybe a couple of table tennis bats on the end of a piece of broom handle would be just as good as half the fancy paddles out there. Me, I'd rather be out paddling than become a gear freak, and spend the rest of my life talking about sea canoeing. So far this year I've done a 14 day trip to the Furneaux Group of islands, two separate 5 day trips to the Hunter Island Group (which includes one of only two Albatross rookeries in Tasmania), and numerous weekend trips. (See the Maatsuyker Canoe Club homepage as below) I paddle with other people in different types of kayaks, with different paddles to mine, and to each other - we all seem to paddle along at the same speed - the type of paddle seems relatively unimportant. My own paddle (for over 20 years) is 8'2" (2.5m) long. It has flat fibreglass blades (22" X 5") laid up on a one and half inch aluminium shaft. Laurie Ford. laurie.ford_at_tassie.net.au http://www.tassie.net.au/~lford *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.gasp-seakayak.net/paddlewise/ ***************************************************************************Received on Tue Jul 21 1998 - 16:51:16 PDT
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Thu Aug 21 2025 - 16:29:58 PDT