Re: [Paddlewise] bracing and power

On Sat, Jul 17, 2010 at 9:33 PM, MATT MARINER BROZE
<marinerkayaks_at_msn.com>wrote:

>  Something just didn't seem right but I was having trouble putting my
> finger on it....
>

Yeah, I'm having trouble putting my finger on it too. I did a float test
with my GP and it supports it's entire weight while held vertically with
something like 80% of a single paddle blade in the water. So not only is the
paddle very light, I can rest some of the weight of my arms on it sitting
still with only one blade fully in the water.  After thinking more about it
while paddling yesterday, I came to the thought that buoyancy is a very
small factor while in mid-stroke as there are so many things you can do with
the blade angle to take the "weight" off your arms during a stroke, and to
support your arms and heck, even the your torso, that the buoyancy of a
paddle blade while in the water is much less important than the weight of
the paddle while it is out of the water and your arms are all that's holding
it up.

And as for weight in the ends, clearly we have to accelerate/decelerate the
paddle while paddling. Add to that the number of strokes besides the forward
stroke that even I do that decelerate and accelerate the paddle where the
mass in the ends is a bad thing, for example sculling.

So, a zero mass paddle is the holy grail, and the closer to that the better.
And since we have to rotate that mass while paddling, the less percentage
wise in the ends the better.

But there's always another question, and now I wonder if thinner is better
in the ends. If the same rigidity was attained with the same mass in the
blade, would we want the blade to sink or float, or be neutral?  I have no
answer for this, only the question and a current, unexplained preference
(habit?) for float.

Now, about the lift vectors and profile drag during the catch and
release.... (he ducks)
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