[Paddlewise] Hawkesbury Classic and currents

G'Day,

Paddled the Hawkesbury Classic overnight last Saturday and Sunday. This was
the race for which several Paddlewisers gave me advice on how to assess where
to catch back eddies during a flood tide.

Completed the 110km in 14hrs 55m, which isn't a bad time. It was way too dark
to assess eddies during the 2nd flood tide but at the start during daylight I
found them easily and they seemed to add a knot to my speed allowing me to
overtake paddlers that I could otherwise barely keep up with.

>From 2:30 am to 4:30 am was awkward, no other paddlers ahead of me, a moonless
overcast night and very very dark with phosphorescence streaming at my bow and
dripping off the paddle blades. Got lost for about ten minutes then saw a
green light flashing away in the distance. All the flashing lights:
headlights, navigation lights etc, played tricks with my never brilliant eyes
and I started seeing optical illusions. These included a great many bridges
looking like aqueducts covered in shrubs, but there were no bridges in
reality. There was an imaginary street sign that appeared and vanished on the
water and at one stage a whole field of wild waving grass on the water.
Fortunately it was only my eyes and not my head so I had enough sense not to
go for a walk on the grass! Unfortunately none of these optical illusions
included mermaids - ah well can't have everything!

Anyway a wonderful Paddle and what worked well for me was

- using the back eddies when it was light.
- maintaining a clean high angle paddle stroke.
- organising a well fitting low abrasion seat and clothing
- Alternating 40km paddles with 2hr Pyramid sprint sessions every weekend for
training.
- Eating about 50 grams of carbohydrate and drinking 500ml of water every hour
/ hour and a half. The 50g carbs were typically a single sandwich or an energy
bar, or a banana and sesame seed bar, or an energy gel and sesame seed bar.
But the sandwiches which weighed almost exactly 50g seemed most effective.

What I coiuld have done better would have been to set up a bag and tube for
drinking instead of using bottled water. Better knowledge of the river would
also have helped. A better lighting system to see the map. My paddling Buddy
Dee had organised all of these and finisjhed an hour ahead of me, though I
suspect she was also much more tenacious than me. But I finished with a sprint
and with gas still in the tank and thanks to Paddlewisers for the advice on
eddies.

All the best, PeterO
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