"Shawn W. Baker" wrote: > Mike wrote: > >If your blade angle is good and your paddle still dives, it suggests to me > >that you're pulling down on the paddle before the sweep is complete > >rather than continuing all the way around. > I think that's what I'm doing.. > > [...] > >Make sure you're not pulling the paddle down (sort of c-c) - > >the standard advice is to follow your paddle around with your head > >(i.e. watch your paddle blade all the way round). > > I am following it with my head; I can see it as I have to rotate the > blade 90* to pop it out of the water. My elbow is coming in tucked next > to my body--is this right or do I need to have my arm fully extended and > have my hand/elbow/arm finish well behind my body? This is probably most of your problem. Your arm should remain extended all the way around. If you're ending with the elbow close to your body, then you're pulling on the paddle to get your arm in. This is sinking your paddle. I guess the "look at your blade" approach is supposed to get you to concentrate on keeping your arm straight and your head (ear) down on your shoulder. Ideally you should keep your head/shoulders/arm relatively rigid from the time you start your sweep until you're nearly finished. This way, the rotation is coming only from your trunk and not from using, say, your biceps. So think "two rotations" - 1) rotation of the upper trunk to get the sweep, 2) rotation of the hips to get the kayak right side up. One way to guarentee that you've got it right is to slow the sweep down. When I first learned the screw roll, the instructor had me do it till I got it right then do it over and over, slower each time. If you can't do it really slow, you're relying on strength (arm pull) rather than on technique (clean sweep and good hip rotation). Mike *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Tue Jun 22 1999 - 17:48:36 PDT
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