[Paddlewise] Ah ha on my Stroke

I just wanted to share what a great time I had this weekend when I "got it."
I think I owe some thanks to Ken Rasmussen but I'm not sure.  I printed off
his article on rolling and thought I read it there but when I got home
Saturday evening I reread that thing 3 times and it's not there so I'm
thinking it was in something else he wrote here.





Anyway, all I remembered was something about the zipper of the PFD (that's
it!) and I think something was said about crossing the centerline with the
zipper.  Almost as soon as I got in my boat on Saturday I had that visual of
letting my PFD zipper cross the centerline and off I went!  It was incredible.
I've only been paddling for a year and I have heard other illustrations about
pretend there's a big ball in front of you, present there's a box in front of
you.  Well, I was just taking everybody's instructions and putting them to use
the best I could.  But this illustration was it!  I've tried to figure out why
this worked and others didn't and the only thing I can come up with is that it
got my focus down near my navel and not up in the chest area.  Whatever it was
I ain't never gonna forget it!  :)





I went to a pool session on Sunday and a couple of the women who were on the
trip on Saturday commented on my "fast boat."  <hahahaha>  I had to laugh.  My
boat isn't fast.  In fact, I've only had it a year and I'm shopping for one
that fits me better.  I currently own a Merlin XT and one of the criterion I
have for my next boat is that the cockpit depth is *not* going to be 14".
(I'm barely 5'2".)





So far I've tried an Ellesmere, a Looksha IVS, and an Elan.  I've found a
Shadow Hawk that someone is selling and also a Mariner Express that I'm hoping
to demo real soon, hopefully this weekend.





Janet












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