Monday photo feature

One of my very first slalom races was one of the old "Citizen Race" events they used to have on the Nantahala River in western North Carolina.  I think this photo is from 1992, at which time I was in my mid-20s, a very advanced age to be entering such a sport.  But every time I look at this photo I see myself as a little kid.  Photo by Michael Stout.

Sometimes, winter is not as bad as you think

Before yesterday we'd had a decent run of mild weather, with Fahrenheit temperatures rising into the 50s and even the 60s.  I'd gone several weeks without wearing pogies.  But yesterday morning the pogies were back on.  When I got down to the river the mercury was straining to touch 40 degrees and there was a bitter north breeze blowing.  It felt more like winter again.  But there was a literal "bright" side: the sky was mostly sunny.  Once I was in the boat paddling I got comfortable, and it turned out to be not a bad day to paddle at all.  I warmed up and did three 8-stroke sprints in the harbor; I think the sprints felt a little bit more fluid than they had been.  Then I paddled out onto the Mississippi and spent the rest of the 60 minutes focusing on involving my legs and feet in each stroke.

This morning it was overcast and things seemed sort of a gloomy as I headed downtown to paddle.  Then again, it was a few degrees warmer than yesterday, and there was practically no wind.  The harbor was as smooth as glass.  I warmed up and did another three 8-strokers, and again the sprints felt not great but not terrible either.  I paddled out onto the Mississippi, which was also mostly smooth with a minimal amount of motorized traffic.  Conditions were really pretty ideal.  I paddled a good strong pace up and down the river before returning to the harbor and the dock to complete an 80-minute session.

"Neither rain nor sleet nor snow..."

I spent Wednesday driving home and was in the mood to paddle Thursday morning even though there was a bit of inclement weather about.  A check of the Internet radar showed a big mass of rain closing in on the city of Memphis, and with a couple of errands to run on my way downtown, I knew it would be falling on me by the time I was in the boat.  Fortunately the temperature was mild--around 60 degrees Fahrenheit.

I paddled for 60 minutes in a hard drizzle.  A stiff south wind drove the raindrops right into my face as I paddled from the marina to the mouth of the harbor.  But I didn't let it bother me.  When I was a kid at summer camp, anytime a camper complained about having to do something in the rain, the standard glib reply was "Skin is waterproof."

I paddled a brisk pace until the last ten minutes or so, when I eased up and coasted back to the dock.  The rainfall got quite a bit heavier as I was driving home, so at least in that respect my timing was good.

I followed through on the plan I mentioned in my last post, and did the strength routine while visiting family on Monday and Wednesday.  I did it again back here at home today.

Seizing the mild-weather paddling opportunities

This week we had two lovely warmish sunny days, and I paddled on both of them.  On Tuesday Joe and I did a loop of the harbor, and today I paddled for 80 minutes out on the Mississippi.  In between those two days the weather was wet and/or cold and blustery.

I started today's paddle by warming up and doing another rusty-feeling set of three 8-stroke sprints.  Then I paddled out onto the Mississippi, where an upstream-bound barge rig was creating some good-sized swells.  I went out and tried to surf without much success.  Part of the reason is that I tend to be conservative with such activities in the wintertime, but even if my attitude had been a hundred percent "Sydney or the Bush," I still might not have gotten any decent rides because the waves' troughs were a little too broad.  But at least I got in a few decent sprints.  Soon the waves started petering out, so my bit of surf practice didn't last more than maybe five minutes.  We take what we can get here in the Mid South.

I ferried over to the Arkansas side and paddled upriver toward the Loosahatchie Chute before coming back down and returning to the harbor.  During this period the "thing" I decided to work on was pulling hard through each stroke while keeping the stroke rate pretty low.  It was almost like a "hesitation" drill as I had to make myself go slow during each recovery between strokes.  It made for some good balance practice out on the river.

I'll be out of the boat for most of next week due to holiday travel.  I did the strength routine Monday, Wednesday, and Friday this week, and since my Smart Bell is nice and portable I'll be sticking to that aspect of training next week.

Monday photo feature

We've all seen those heartbreaking photos of birds, turtles, and other critters caught up in plastic six-pack rings that have found their way into our world's waterways.  Yesterday while paddling out on the Mississippi I saw this one in a stand of willows over near the Arkansas side.  So I paddled into the willows and grabbed it.  I took it home, used a pair of scissors to cut apart all the rings, and put it in the trash where it belongs.  Goodie goodie for me!!!!

Muscle memory

This morning was reasonably nice by wintertime standards.  The sky was partly sunny, and with the gentlest of breezes blowing from the south, the water in the harbor was dead calm.  At 50 degrees Fahrenheit it was right on the cusp of being cold enough for pogies, and I opted to go without.  Pogies are a wonderful invention (thanks to whitewater racing pioneers Bill Nutt and Bonnie Losick for the roles they played in their conception and development), but any day I don't have to wear them is a good day in my book.

I started by warming up and doing three 8-stroke sprints in the harbor.  The sprints are still feeling rusty, as my body just doesn't seem to have much turnover right now.  Then I paddled out onto the Mississippi, ferried over to the Arkansas side, and paddled up above the Hernando DeSoto Bridge before coming back downriver and returning to the harbor.

The thing I decided to focus on today was getting my blades fully immersed at the beginning of each stroke.  For some reason I've long had a tendency not to get my right blade all the way in the water; you can see me doing that at times in this video, most of whose footage was shot around 2011-12.  I think I've done a better job of it in more recent years, but I probably ought to charge up the Go Pro camera and shoot some new footage soon so I can see how I'm doing.

Of course, stroke mechanics is something I'm always working on, to one degree or another, every time I paddle.  But today was one of those days when I moved one particular component onto the front burner in my mind, if that makes any sense.  And so I paddled along and tried to plant the blade with precision each time--"speared the fish," as it were--without thrusting my body forward and causing the boat to bob.

I got back to the dock 70 minutes after I'd started.  I can check off another day of practice as a new season looms off in the future.

Milder weather and a variety of activity

The miserable weekend weather finally began to give way to some sunshine Monday, and Tuesday was a gorgeous day with clear skies and an afternoon high around 52 degrees Fahrenheit.  It was a brisk 41 degrees when I arrived at the river to paddle Tuesday morning but it had warmed up to a comfortable 48 degrees by the time I was finished.  I warmed up and did three 8-stroke sprints in the harbor.  It was the first time I had sprinted in any way in a couple of months, and while the energy was there, the form was rusty.  I paddled up the Mississippi to the south end of the Greenbelt Park and then returned to the harbor, where I spent the last 25 minutes of my one-hour session doing a bunch of stroke drills: hesitation drills, one-sided drills, and the "one-two-three-four-FIVE!!!!" drill that Morgan House showed me when I took his clinic last year.  It had been a long time since I'd isolated the various components of my stroke for study, and I'm always struck by how tiring it is to focus that hard on something while I'm paddling.

I'd done a round of my new strength routine on Monday, and I did another round on Wednesday.  I woke up yesterday feeling stiff and sore in my arms and shoulders.  I don't know what might have caused it other than the strength work, but I thought it was odd that the soreness took that long to appear.  Usually it starts up within a day of my doing something new.

Joe hadn't been available for our usual Tuesday paddle, so he joined me yesterday for a loop of the harbor.  The relaxed, "conversational" pace we paddled was helpful as my body worked out the soreness.

I did another round of the strength routine today to close out a decent "business" week here in the early offseason.

Monday photo feature

I'm at a loss for words just after finishing a race on the Pascagoula River on the Mississippi Gulf Coast last year.

A new strength routine

Now that I'm finally feeling better it's time to start thinking about some offseason conditioning again.

I've been doing a "Smart Bell" workout for some 20 years now.  I learned it from a friend named Emerson Wickwire who coached wrestling at the school where I taught back in the late 1990s.  A friend of his, a really good wrestler named Paul Widerman, invented the Smart Bell so he could do a whole variety of dynamic strength exercises.

At long last, I've made a video of the routine I do with the Smart Bell.  I'll be the first to admit it's not the best quality production--I made it all by myself with a camera on a tripod in my house--but hopefully everybody can see what's going on.




(Just in case anybody's curious: I had the radio on while I was making this.  What you're hearing is the "Down In The Alley" program, hosted by Eddie Hankins each Friday morning on WEVL FM 89.9.  It makes about as good a soundtrack as anything I could have come up with.)

Where does one get a Smart Bell these days?  I'm not sure.  They're listed on this Amazon page as "currently unavailable."  As you can see there, their look has changed from the first-generation Smart Bell I'm using in the video.  If you want one then I encourage you to poke around the Internet and see what you can find.  There might be some on Ebay.

Improved health and unimproved weather

Well, I had my CT scan Thursday, and the little bit of information I've been able to extract from my doctor's office indicates it wasn't entirely conclusive.  I have an appointment there next Tuesday, so I should know more no later than then.

In the meantime, I've been feeling significantly better.  Monday was the last full day I dealt with that abdominal discomfort.  I wasn't feeling totally better Tuesday morning, but I went ahead and paddled with Joe in the harbor anyway.  By Tuesday evening I knew I was feeling better, and I've felt more or less back to normal ever since.  And believe me, I'm pleased about that.  But I'm still a little puzzled about this mysterious two-week malady.  I really don't get sick that often, and when I do it almost never lasts more than several days.

I'm now trying to get myself back in motion.  The weather has not been helpful.  I don't think it's been warmer than 45 degrees Fahrenheit in the last week or so.  This weekend has been particularly lousy, as the same storm system that has brought snow and ice to much of the Southeast has given us relentless rain for close to 24 hours.  The temperature has not escaped the mid 30s.

Mind you, winters here in the Mid South are nowhere near as harsh as in places like the upper Great Plains or New England or the Great Lakes region, but in a way I wish that if it must be cold at all, it would just go all the way: I have a friend who lives in New Hampshire who posted on Face Book that he cross-country skied ten miles yesterday, and that's the kind of offseason cross-training I could really sink my teeth into.  Instead, the water stays liquid here just about all winter, and I feel obligated to go out and paddle with a stiff upper lip.  I pleaded the "recovering from illness" excuse to stay in this weekend, but soon enough I need to get back in gear.

Of course, winters are funny here, and just because we've had some nasty blasts early, there's no guarantee it'll stay that way until spring.  Last January I paddled a couple of times when the temperature was in the teens, but after that frigid period the rest of the winter turned out to be quite mild.  The best I can do with this winter training thing is what I always do: take it a day at a time.  With any luck it'll add up to a decent amount of work by the time Earth swings around to its vernal equinox.

Body woes

It's been quite a while since I've posted anything on this canoe and kayak training blog.  The main reason for that is that lately very little canoe and kayak training has taken place around here.

Back on the evening of Tuesday, November 20, I started feeling some discomfort in my abdominal area.  The feeling was still there the next morning, and when I tried to do a round of the strength routine I found I had very little energy.  I concluded that I must have some kind of mild stomach bug and my body was fighting it off.

For the next several days I felt not horrible, exactly, but very low in energy.  I didn't do much more than lie around the house during this time.  Then I started to feel better, and thought I was on the mend--pretty typical when you've got a virus, right?  But the moment I began to resume some normal-life activities, the discomfort returned.  I decided it was time to go see the doctor.  I went in last Tuesday morning and they referred me for an ultrasound procedure and also took blood for some lab tests.

By Thursday the tests had come back negative, and my doctor told me the next step was to have a CT scan to see if there was some kind of mass in my insides.

A mass?  As in, a tumor?  Seriously?

I have to get pre-certification from my insurance company before I can have a CT scan, so I'm having to wait until Thursday to get it done.  (Note: if I had just gone to the emergency room they could have done the scan with no pre-certification requirement.  And there I thought I was doing the right thing by going to my primary-care doctor instead of the emergency room.)  I sincerely hope that my thoughts of tumors and cancer are just me blowing things out of proportion.  But in the meantime I'm still not feeling well and I don't know what else to think.  By tomorrow evening it'll be two weeks that this has been going on.

It's hard even to describe how this feels.  Much of the time it's a perpetual feeling of having to use the bathroom (sometimes Number One, sometimes Number Two) even though my digestion and bodily functions have been working just fine throughout this period.

Saturday was a beautiful day and I decided to try paddling--if nothing else, the cabin fever was driving me mad.  I paddled for an hour and felt just fine in the boat.  I didn't do anything bold; I stayed in the harbor because a south wind was making things rough out on the Mississippi, and even though I was feeling good enough to paddle at a healthy clip, I didn't throw in any all-out sprints.  Once I was back on the dock I was happy to have gotten out and done something with my body at last.

By Saturday evening, as if on cue, I was back to that mild lousy feeling.  It continued all through yesterday and I'm still not feeling so hot this morning.

It's still early in the offseason, so if I have to go through a forced layoff, I guess this is about as good a time as any.  But not knowing how much longer this is going to go on is frustrating.  Right now there's nothing I can do but see what the CT scan reveals this Thursday.