Regardless of water level, I strive to savor the process

It's been an underwhelming high-water season on the Mississippi River.  The river typically reaches its peak flows in May and June each year, and more often than not that means topping the 30-foot mark on the Memphis gauge.  In the last decade we've seen it exceed 40 feet a couple of times.

But this year the river has struggled to rise above 20 feet.  That's the result of meager precipitation across the Midwest from the Rockies to the Appalachians.  In the last few weeks there have been some thunderstorm systems in the watershed, but they have not been large enough, intense enough, or long-lasting enough to bring about a significant rise in the river level.  Storms in the last few days are currently bringing the Memphis gauge reading from 9 feet to 16 feet--a noticeable rise, but not anything to write home about, really.

The "dry" season in the Mississippi basin occurs in the late summer and fall, and unless it's less dry than usual this year, I predict we'll be seeing a record-low river stage by late fall.

The nice thing about the Mississippi is that even at its lowest-ever flows, it's still got plenty of water for paddling.  And I've been doing so regularly, four times a week most weeks.  As I've noted in previous posts, I've been feeling pressed for time because of the demands of checking in with my mother on top of the duties of ordinary life.  A typical session has been less than an hour.  But once in a while I let myself linger on the river for over an hour, especially when there are opportunities for barge wake surfing.

I don't have any races planned, but that's not really so disheartening for me, as I've grown to realize that practice is where the magic happens.  Bill Endicott, the longtime coach of the U.S. whitewater team, has written that the high-achieving people he knows all share one thing: a fascination with the process.  The late Jerry Peters, who coached basketball at the high school I attended and was admired statewide for the consistent success of his teams, used to say that going to the gym for practice each afternoon was by far his favorite part of the job.

We've got a teenage athlete here in Memphis who has gained national recognition.  Miles Nesmith, who just graduated from Central High School, has been the nation's top high school triple jumper for the last couple of seasons.  He recently took the TJ title at the Nike Outdoor Nationals and qualified for the U.S team that will attend the under-20 world championships.  He'll embark on his collegiate career at Kansas State this fall.

This weekend Nesmith competed in the Ed Murphey Classic, an elite meet that occurs annually here in Memphis, and the Daily Memphian ran this story about his experience.  (There's a paywall, so I'll paste the text of the story at the bottom of this post.)

The reason I'm sharing this story here is that it's another example of somebody embracing the process.  Here was Nesmith in his first pro meet that he had no chance of winning, basically using it as a practice session by tinkering with his technique.  It was an opportunity to learn something about himself and the performances he might be capable of in the future, and in the end he actually exceeded expectations by finishing fifth overall among much more seasoned jumpers.

I love stories like that, and they provide me with inspiration during periods like this, when it feels like I'm doing the bare minimum in my athletic life while grappling with weightier issues elsewhere.  Even when I have time to paddle just a half hour or 40 minutes, no session is wasted.  I haven't mentioned it lately, but I'm still working hard on leg drive and rotating down in my hips, and these "quickie" paddles give me a chance to focus hard on that, whereas that's harder to do during longer paddles.

That's my profound thought for today.  Here's the text of that Daily Memphian article, written by high school sports reporter John Varlas:

Miles Nesmith has accomplished plenty in the few weeks since graduating from Central High.

A second straight state championship in the triple jump? Check.

An under-20 national title and a spot in the world championships next month? Check and check.

Competing and beating the pros? That’s also a check.

“My first pro meet,” the future Kansas State athlete said after rubbing elbows with some top-flight competition at the Ed Murphey Classic at the University of Memphis. The youngest competitor in the field — and the lowest seed — Nesmith gave a fine accounting for himself.

His second jump of 53 feet, 6.5 inches qualified him for the eight-man final. Nesmith then went 53-5, 52-1 and 53.1 to place fifth overall.”

Compared to last month’s nationals, when his winning jump was 52-5, it was a stronger performance overall. And it’s one that Nesmith said he needed now that he’s essentially “starting over” after accomplishing everything you could accomplish in the high school ranks.

“I was looking forward to it because I knew it was going to be kind of a precursor to what I’m going to see in college,” Nesmith said. “I’ve kind of established myself as the best (among high schoolers) so now it’s like starting all over again.

“Everybody here is better than me. Pro guys. College guys. But I just came out here and competed and got a PR.”

And from the moments that he took off the green Central polo shirt that he warmed up in, Nesmith looked like he belonged. His longest jump came after a several-minute delay while staff members tried to get a finicky laser measuring device to work.

He then rounded out the day by going over 53 two more times— all while using a shorter approach that allowed him to concentrate on some of the finer points perhaps more so than speed as he tunes up for the U20 worlds in Eugene, Oregon.

“It’s basically just bringing less steps, Nesmith said. “I went from 72 feet; usually I’m going from 102. The idea is just going back to the basics, working on the technique of the jump. Then you add more speed with the idea that you’ll jump a little farther.

“I’ve got a lot more in tank.”

And when he wasn’t jumping, Nesmith stationed himself at the end of the runway in an effort to soak up anything he could from his older and more experienced competitors.

After all, they’ve already been where Nesmith is hoping to get to.

“I’m watching these guys who have been to world championships, been to Olympic Games,” he said. “Jordan Scott, he’s No. 3 in the world. I could have been in the tent but I was watching.

“It was surreal and I was just trying to take everything in.”

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Character under indictment

I mentioned back on June 21 that David Hearn, a world champion and three-time U.S. Olympian in whitewater slalom, had been arrested for touching the peeling liner of the Reflecting Pool in Washington, DC, not far from his home.  A grand jury went on to grant U.S. Attorney for DC Jeanine Pirro an indictment of Davey for doing $1000 of damage to the monument.  $1000 is the amount that makes such a crime a felony rather than a misdemeanor.

Davey's arraignment took place in District of Columbia Superior Court this past Thursday.  When he emerged with his legal team, he was greeted by a throng of supporters:

Personally, I am distressed to see a friend of mine forced to defend himself against this charge, which I believe has no merit.  As his lawyer points out, it’s an outrageous misuse of government power.

At the same time, I am heartened to see the robust turnout of people in support of Davey.  It's a reminder of a pretty basic truth: if you go through life being nice to people, treating them with respect, then people will show up for you when times are tough.  In the video I see dozens of people doing what they could and wishing they could do more.

Davey’s congressman in the U.S. House of Representatives, Jamie Raskin (D-MD), released this statement:

Davey Hearn would never desecrate a federal building or landmark by writing his name on it or affixing his name illegally to it or engaging in any other kind of political graffiti, vandalism or delinquency. He would never intentionally damage government property. Whether we are talking about the White House, the Reflecting Pool or the Kennedy Center, Davey would never try to alter, bulldoze or redesign federal property or buildings without explicit Congressional authorization and direction. Davey is an honorable and law-abiding citizen who has won real giant prizes, including eight world championships. He did so without any corrupt practices and only through his magnificent hard work and surpassing dedication to the team. He would never try to undercut or sabotage anyone, much less our entire community.

"I hope—and will do everything I can to guarantee—that Davey gets true due process and a fair trial on these absurdly trumped-up charges. It is only a matter of time before an impartial judge and jury recognize that this case has been built on a Kafkaesque arrest and Orwellian charges.

I know some people will read that and say “Pssh.  Just another politician exploiting this incident to make some political hay.”  And yes, it is a political statement, with its thinly-veiled digs at our nation’s 47th president.

But the thing is, I’ve known Davey myself for several decades.  At first I was just a fan as I began to dabble in racing after a decade or so of recreational whitewater paddling.  Eventually, as my involvement in racing increased, I got to know Davey and become his friend, and I learned that all the things I'd admired about him as a wide-eyed fanboy were in fact honest-to-God true.  If you took the Scholastic Aptitude Test in high school, then maybe you encountered this analogy:

ostensible : real :: reputation : character

Throughout his career as a celebrated athlete in the paddling world, Davey's reputation and his character were one and the same.  His sportsmanlike way of conducting himself at big races, both in the boat and on the bank, was the same way he conducted himself at practice on the Potomac/C&O Feeder Canal in the dead of winter.  What you saw was what he was.  Always.

And everything Rep. Raskin says about Davey in his statement is consistent with everything I've observed first-hand.  Davey is an honorable and law-abiding citizen.  He does believe in hard work and dedication to the team.  I have never seen him try to undercut or sabotage anyone.  Just consider Davey's career-long rivalry with fellow U.S. team member Jon Lugbill, to whom Davey settled for second place at five (five!) world championships.  I have to believe that that gnawed at Davey sometimes, but in public statements he always strove to see the good in his results and always spoke well of his rival.  And, he knew that his own success was ultimately tied to a healthy training relationship with Lugbill.

I mention above that I believe the criminal charge against Davey is false.  I do have some factual basis for that belief, most notably that there had been news reports of the Reflecting Pool's liner peeling loose at least few days before Davey's arrest on the 19th of June.  But my knowledge of Davey's character is the main reason I believe he is innocent.  I'm not at all surprised that Davey would be curious about a delaminating liner, because such things are literally his field: as a racer he designed and built his own boats by laminating composite materials, and he later owned a business that sold composite materials to boatbuilders and other craftsmen.  Meanwhile, anybody privy to Davey's social media posts knows that he's not a fan of the current administration in Washington, but it's just not his style to act out destructively.  It's not the Davey I know.  These words would probably not get anywhere in a court of law, nor should they.  But they are sufficient for my own peace of mind, and I will be very surprised if the prosecution produces even a scrap of evidence that proves me wrong.

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Monday photo feature

I'm not doing any racing or any real training these days, but a number of my friends are, so here's a photo I lifted from the Face Book page of my friend Mike Herbert of Rogers, Arkansas.  He participated in the Freedom Race in Missouri on Saturday, and this is what he wrote about it:

Great day to be racing. The Freedom race is a 63 mile trip down the beautiful Missouri River. We had almost ideal conditions with only a slight but persistent headwind with only one barge to deal with. Got the solo surfski win and was 3rd overall behind 7-man Joe’s boat and one good double surfski. Christel shuttled me with Nebo waiting at the finish line!

"Joe's boat" was a 7-person craft led by race director Joe Mann.  The "one good double surfski" was paddled by my friend Scott Cummins, with whom I paddled and camped in Kentucky a couple of weeks ago, and a guy named Jeff Behrns.  Christel?  That would be Mike's wife, while Nebo is another very important member of his family, his dog.  That's Nebo helping Mike celebrate in the picture.

Mike covered the 63 miles (approx. 102 kilometers) in six hours, 10 minutes.  He got some help from the river's flow, but not as much in a previous year when he clocked five hours, 39 minutes.  Even that latter time is longer than I care to be sitting in a boat competing, but like I said, these days I'm not racing and Mike is, so Mike has the right to do whatever he wants.

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A not-so-sunny outlook as summer settles in

This time a week ago I was nursing some strained oblique muscles.  I'm happy to report that that particular ailment seems to be a thing of the past.

Unfortunately, I'm still living with pain and tightness in the right side of my neck.  I haven't mentioned it in a while, so here's a quick history: I arrived home from my trip to South Africa on the 5th of February.  On February 9, I received the second of two shingles vaccine shots, and by the following day I was feeling awful.  For some 24 hours I suffered from severe chills that made me clench into a fetal position as I lay in bed.

By the day after that, I was feeling better.  But the one thing that lingered was the discomfort in my neck, and that condition has lingered, and lingered, and lingered some more.  I sought treatment from my chiropractor, who performed adjustments and some dry needling, but after a few weeks of that I was doing no better.  My chiropractor suggested I get a neck brace to stretch the area, and I did, but after trying that for a couple of weeks I was seeing no change.

I'm pretty sure this is the result of the impinged nerves in my upper spinal cord that an MRI revealed in 2023.  Back then I got a couple of nerve-block injections that had no lasting effect; the next step would have been a surgical procedure that I think would have entailed fusing a couple of vertebrae, but that would have resulted in a loss of range of motion in my neck, and at that time, at least, that seemed worse than what I was already dealing with.

So, these days I'm just living with the discomfort, and I'm really at a loss as to what else I can do.  I keep hoping it'll all run its course and loosen up on its own, but as of now it's showing no signs of doing that.  Will it be with me for the rest of my life?  Hell if I know.  Meanwhile, I'm spending so much time worrying over my 90-year-old mother's condition that navigating the medical care system for my own woes is simply more than I can bear to consider right now.

The neck discomfort is definitely with me in the boat, but it doesn't directly interfere with paddling, so I'm trying my best to find some solace on the water.  There are no big races coming up, so I'm not really training for anything.  It's not like this time last year, when I had a robust fitness program going to get myself lean and mean for a trip through the Grand Canyon.  No, these days my paddling sessions are just mental health breaks, something that allows me to look back on each day and think, "At least one decent thing happened today."

On Saturday I went down to the river and paddled for 50 minutes.  Yesterday I paddled for 40 minutes.  I got something in.  It feels like the best I can do these days.

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Poking along in early summer

I paddled Tuesday morning after a day of heavy rain on Monday.  The water was muddy in the harbor, and once I got out to the Mississippi I found lots of woody debris, including whole trees, floating down the river.  I suspect most of it had been flushed out of the Wolf and Loosahatchie Rivers, as it was all close to the Tennessee bank.

The pain was all gone from my right oblique abdominal area, and as if on cue, there were a couple of upstream-moving barge rigs down below the trio of bridges at the south end of downtown.  I decided I was ready to surf.  The rigs were moving in close succession, so I moved down and fell in behind the second one.  The waves in its train were tall with small, deep troughs, and I confess to being a little spooked by them, but a bit farther back the waves began to smooth out and I was able to get a few good rides.  Once the fun had run its course, I ferried over to the Tennessee bank for the paddle back up to the harbor, and I found myself threading through a gauntlet of sticks, logs, branches, and tree trunks.  I currently have a big surf rudder on my ski, and several times I got debris stuck on it and once I even had to get out of the boat to clear it off.  It all probably added close to ten minutes to my trek back to the dock.

I planned to do a bike ride Wednesday, but my rear tire was flat.  On further inspection, I discovered that the tire's wire lattice was starting to poke out.  In other words, I need a new tire, probably two, since I bought the two tires at the same time several years ago.  So I called off Wednesday's ride, and now I need to make time for some maintenance work.

[Edit: it turns out that what I thought was the wire lattice poking out was actually a small nail that had stuck into the tire.  As soon as my neighbor the Victory Bicycle Studio opens today, I'll go get their expert opinion on the condition of my tires.]

I went back to the river yesterday and, feeling tired in the boat, I was perfectly happy to find no barge traffic out on the river.  I paddled for a relaxed 40 minutes.  After several pleasant days, hotter weather was starting to move in by yesterday.  The forecast is showing Fahrenheit temperatures in the high 90s next week.

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Monday photo feature

My friend Joe Royer shot this lovely photo of Muscovy ducks on my dock at dusk six years ago.

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Ebbing pain for me and some legal pain for a friend

I rode my bike for a little over an hour on Friday.  I hadn't been riding that much lately and it felt good to get back to some of that.

I'm happy to report that by yesterday morning the oblique muscles in the right side of my torso were feeling significantly better.  I could still feel some tenderness in the area once I was in the boat, however, so I limited myself to 40 minutes of easy paddling, and I stayed in the northern half of the harbor, because if I paddled down to the harbor's mouth and saw barge traffic out on the Mississippi, I might have been tempted to go out and surf.

This morning there was again just a hint of discomfort in my oblique as I launched from the dock, so again I kept the paddling to 40 minutes.  This time I did go down to the mouth of the harbor, but there was no commercial traffic on the river, so I was led not into temptation.

In other canoe & kayak news, one of this country's most decorated athletes was arrested next to the Reflecting Pool in Washington, DC.  Davey Hearn, a two-time world champion and three-time Olympian in whitewater slalom, was out on a bike ride and stopped to have a look at the pool's peeling paint.  When he reached down to touch one of the big loose flakes, National Park police swooped in, handcuffed him, and booked him on charges of vandalism.  The story has been picked up by news outlets across the nation and the world; you can read the BBC account here.  In the 30-plus years that I've known Davey I've never heard him utter anything even approaching a lie, so his claims in the story are perfectly credible to me.  Of course, I wasn't there and I don't know precisely what took place, but I'm happy to offer that bit of character-witness testimony.

It's actually not the first time Davey has run afoul of the authorities while doing little more than living his life.  30 years ago, a few months after Davey had won the second of his two world titles and a few months before he made the second of his three U.S. Olympic teams, the Potomac River rose to flood levels.  While most people looked out over the river and saw danger (and they weren't wrong, I should note), Davey looked out over the river near his home in Bethesda and saw "the perfect wave," and decided to go out and surf.  Before long there was a helicopter circling overhead, and police were yelling at Davey to get off the river.  When he did so, the cops descended and put him in cuffs, and the response of one officer in particular was way out of proportion with what the situation called for.  Eventually a judge dismissed the case, and I hope the same will occur when Davey reports to court on the 9th of July.

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A good weekend getaway and some muscle pain

My paddling friend from Louisville, Scott Cummins, and I agreed we were ready to escape the grinds of our respective lives for a couple of days.  So we met up for some camping and paddling last weekend at Land Between The Lakes.  This National Recreation Area sits between Kentucky Lake, a reservoir on the Tennessee River, and Lake Barkley, an impoundment on the Cumberland River.  It's roughly equidistant from our hometowns.

As I mentioned in a post back in January, Scott is now the owner of Venture Sport, Inc., an importer of racing kayaks from several South African manufacturers.  He brought along a couple of boats made by the Fenn company for me to try.

I've never claimed any great expertise in canoe and kayak design.  To be honest, it's just not an aspect of the sport that interests me all that much.  That doesn't mean I don't consider it important to have a well-designed boat; I absolutely do.  It's just that when the time comes for me to get a new boat, the process of evaluating the available designs and selecting the best one for me feels like kind of a nuisance that I want to be done with as quickly as possible so that I can get back on the water and, you know... paddle.

Over the years I've relied on this rule of thumb when shopping for a new boat: try out a few designs from the most reputable manufacturers, and go with the one that you feel most comfortable in.  My rule might not be especially empirical or grounded in scientific method, but it has served me well enough.  Last weekend I started out in a Sailfish, and I felt very comfortable in that boat.  It was stable but also glided very nicely.  After a while I switched to a Cuda, and I found it much less comfortable, mainly because of its lower primary stability.  The secondary stability was good, and I never really felt like I was going to flip, but I was still expending lots of energy just keeping my balance so I could take good effective strokes.  I should add that there was a great deal of slop out on Kentucky Lake from all the motorized boat traffic, especially on Saturday afternoon, so a fair amount of open-water survival skill was required.

If I were going to buy a new boat today (and I am not looking to do so at this moment, to be clear), it would seem that the Sailfish would be an obvious choice.  But Scott, who is sort of the opposite of me in his enthusiasm for boat design, had a lot to say that muddied the waters for me.  Like I said, it felt like the Sailfish was gliding very well, but Scott said the Cuda was the better boat in terms of hull speed.  Most of the races I do in my part of the country are on flatwater and easy water, so I do want my boat for these races to have the best hull speed possible.  But I also consider it very important to be comfortable in the boat, and I wasn't feeling that way in the Cuda.  When I was younger, simply logging more "seat time" in a boat was all I needed to achieve a greater comfort level, but I'm finding that less effective now as I approach my 59th birthday.

Anyway... like I said, I'm not really in the market for a new boat at this time.  My current boats are still in reasonably good condition, and having spent a lot of money lately on my forays into the Grand Canyon and South Africa, I'm in a mood to lay low and live simply for a while.  Nevertheless, it was good for me to get out and try something new, and I'm grateful to Scott for giving me that opportunity.  Hopefully in the coming months I'll have more chances to try out some boats and ready myself to make a good informed decision whenever I do spring for a new boat.  I encourage anybody reading this to consider Scott and Venture Sport for future purchases of high-performance kayaks.  The Venture Sport website doesn't seem to be working at this time, but you can find it on Face Book and other social media platforms.

Scott and I camped at Hillman Ferry Campground on the eastern shore of Kentucky Lake, where we enjoyed good access to the water.  We paddled a couple of hours each day on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.  The area also has an interesting trail system, and we did a fun, if sweaty, day hike Saturday morning.  We spent some time soaking up the culture of small-town western Kentucky, and conversing by the campfire in the evenings.

Of course, here in the 21st Century every great adventure must be capped with a selfie:

I'm back home in Memphis now, and was back on the Memphis riverfront Tuesday morning for a relaxed 50-minute paddle.  I spent Tuesday afternoon working on a project I've had going for the last couple of months: my 110-year-old house has a lot of interior brickwork that has needed rehab work for as long as I've owned the place, and I've been "tuck-pointing," or scraping out the old crumbling mortar and replacing it with new mortar.

Wednesday morning I woke up with pain in the right side of my torso, and I'm pretty sure it was the tuck-pointing, not the paddling, I'd done on Tuesday that caused it.  I'd been up on the ladder and using lots of elbow grease to press the new mortar into all the crevices I wanted to get it into, and it was just the sort of effort that could strain my oblique abdominal muscles.

Over years of following baseball, I've learned that players who sustain "oblique" injuries often end up missing lots and lots of games, so I knew I had to proceed gingerly in the boat when I went back down to the river yesterday morning.  Sure enough, I was feeling a little stab of pain with each stroke on my right, so I limited myself to just 20 minutes of very easy paddling.  I hoped that some light engagement of the ailing muscles would be helpful in the healing process, and since then that seems to be what's happened: this morning the area is still sore, but not nearly as bad as it was on Wednesday.

Summer begins for real this Sunday, and I'm settling in for a long, hot, and relatively quiet one.

For more information on what this blog is about, click here.