Jack Martin wrote: > An interesting thread. Agreed > Why > should we, as a worldwide paddling community, even attempt to stardardize, > package, wholesale and retail some self-styled "Greenland style" when it > appears that there is such a diversity of style and technique at the source? Because we have to start somewhere? This reminds me of my other sporting fanaticism, Nordic skiing (cross country to some). The advent of freestyle techniques in the early eighties threw everything in the air. It took a long time to sort out the good and bad techniques. Now there are standard techniques that are being taught. However, not all the top racers use them! Just because it's Nordic skiing,doesn't mean that the Nordic countries command the skills development. Freestyle, for all intents and purposes, can be considered an American invention (Bill Koch). I've learned a specific set of freestyle techniques and practice them faithfully. Now to kayaking. We need to have a small number of basic techniques to teach in a standard way for folks to get started. You can't say that there are x number of ways to do it and only people from county Y can teach it. You have to start with something basic and get the student reasonably proficient. Then they can expand their skill set (get better than the teacher) Look at rolling. There are a gazillion ways to roll a kayak, but most people start with a Pawlata, them work up to a screw roll. WW fanatics will learn the c-c as well. Then maybe a hand roll. The real keeners will then add several other rolls. But it usually starts with a basic sweep roll like the Pawlata. Imagine if every person had to learn a different technique just because there are many. So with paddle strokes. There are many ways of doing "Euro" paddle strokes. I still question the logic of teaching a flatwater racing skill like leg pushing in a tight sea kayak. However, collectively, we teach that sort of thing. I took two advanced paddling lessons at a symposium recently. The two instructors taught _completely_ different techniques. The first advocated a close-hand-position, high angle, high stroke rate technique, while the other showed us a wider hand position, lower angle and lower stroke rate technique. Which one is "right"? I don't have a serious problem with taking a standard approach to a "Greenland" paddle stroke. Get people started. Some will use it forever, others will investigate other variations. The variations will come from the Greenlanders. And from others. 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 Wed Jul 07 1999 - 18:52:25 PDT
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