>Oh No! The Euro/Greenland paddle can of worms has been opened again. >Matt Broze >http://www.marinerkayaks.com > >From: aburton1_at_maine.rr.com <aburton1_at_maine.rr.com> >>SNIP >>I assumed I couldn't keep up with it because I am fairly new >>to Greenland style paddling, but the guide said he knew >>very few people who could keep up with euro style >>paddlers touring.....or it may just be I don't yet have a >>good Greenland technique... In all fairness, the original poster is quite correct about not keeping up with a Greenland paddle. I find that I constantly have to slow down when using my Greenland paddle in order for those laggards with their Euro blades to keep up :^) In all seriousness, it is all in the technique. In my experience poor technique (the all arms, "plop-it-in-all-pull-it-back" approach) applied to a Euro blade will often give better forward stroke speeds than with a Greenland paddle. There are a variety of forward stroke techniques (angling the blade forward, sliding strokes, etc) that can take some time to learn with the Greenland paddle. Applying Euro technique to a Greenland stick (and vice-versa) will be bound to disappoint you. The differences in technique are nothing mysterious and are easy to do, but they vary enough from "Euro-teaching" that many folks never learn them or require many years of trial-and-error experimentation on their own. You may also need to "unlearn" some habits which can prove very difficult to do. Sure you can slosh along using any technique that you want but whether you are using a Greenland stick, a spooned Euro blade, a wing, a canoe paddle or whatever, you have to expect to invest adequate time to learn the "personality" and quirks of your chosen tool. John Heath is coming out with a new video around Christmas that not only includes above and below water sequences of Maligiaq Padilla (the Greenland Champion) rolling and bracing but also has footage of Maligiaq demonstrating and explaining approximately *five* common forward stroke techniques used in Greenland. Keep and eye tuned to John's webpage at <http://www.fbtc.net/~jdheath/> for future details. This should be a good resource and hopefully will end some of the "it-must-be-done-this-way" dogma that is currently impeding Greenland-style instruction from self-taught instructors in North America today. I also hope that the focus for learning proper "Greenland-style" technique will finally be placed upon the Greenlanders themselves where it belongs. Greg Stamer *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Sat Sep 18 1999 - 08:32:22 PDT
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