I've often wondered about the "work out" benefits of kayaking...and the callories burned. One of my paddling buddies, Tim Hamilton, is a fitness trainer and here is his trip report of our last paddle where he documented the benefits as recorded on his heart monitor. Sunday, August 14, 2005 We launched from the Corpus Christi Marina and headed out at about 7:15 am. I zeroed my trip computer on the GPS, and punched the start button on my Polar heart rate monitor. Winds were quite light at that point but I had a suspicion that might change. According to Accuweather reports the winds were about 6 mph as we launched. Ken Johnson and I headed across the inner harbor, sheltered from the rougher wind and waves of Corpus Christi Bay by the stone breakwater. We turned out into the bay and headed SE as usual, so as to have a tailwind on our return leg. We decided to make for a platform 4.2 miles out. We usually manage to reach that in about an hour, depending on conditions. I purposely took it a bit easy and paced myself at first, knowing we might cover some distance and do some surfing later. About 25 minutes into the trip I noted my heart rate at 116bpm, moving into the gentle breeze and light chop at about 4 to 4.2 miles per hour. We reached the rig in exactly one hour and by now the wind had increased to about 10 or so I thought. (According to Accuweather it was now 16mph.) We agreed to hop on a bit further to the next wellhead, which I judged to be about a half-mile distant. The breeze had kicked up substantially and I figured it was blowing about 15 mph. The waves also had come up a bit and were now pretty solid 2-3 feet. (They always look bigger than that though.) The kayaks handled beautifully as always, leaping and diving through one wave after another. A check of my heart monitor after one hour showed that my heart rate was drifting up and was now around 130 to 135bpm. I had misjudged the distance to the second well head; it was actually a bit over a mile. We were both ready to turn around and enjoy some surfing, and we both gulped down some fluids and got pointed back toward the downtown skyline. We began surfing the waves immediately and after a few minutes, a check of the heart rate showed 150bpm, which surprised me. I guess I was too busy accelerating and maneuvering to realize my exertion level. I caught some really decent waves and began noting my max speed as much as possible. (My GPS does not record max speed so yes I have to look down at it while surfing). I was hitting about 9mph on some of the faster waves. To make a long story short, during the final hour of surfing my heart rate stayed above 150bpm and hit a max of 176. According to the monitor, I also burned 1,627 calories, which I really found amazing. Total trip time was 2:38, and that includes all water stops and even Kens impromptu roll. I had an absolute blast along with a great workout. I was really accelerating and working hard to catch waves and several times I caught up 2 or 3 in succession, literally running right up over the backside of them and dropping in. It was really exhilarating. My max speed was 10.9 mph, and it felt like I was flying. To round out the data, I also consumed 70 oz of fluid, 48 oz of which was water and 22 oz of a product I like called Accelerade. (Like Gatorade but with some better ingredients). Upon reaching the inner harbor, Ken and I covered the last mile (back upwind) at a fairly easy pace. I think if you exclude all our stops, our average speed was more like 5 to 5.5 mph. Another great day on Corpus Christi Bay! Tim Hamilton *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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