Monday photo feature

At the Ocean Springs race on Saturday, the overall winner of each boat class was awarded a First-World-War-style combat helmet.  Just how authentic these helmets are is a thing of which I'm not entirely certain: they're made of plastic, and I'm pretty sure plastics weren't developed until the Second World War.  I think I'd want to be wearing something sturdier in an attack of mortar shells and rocket-propelled grenades and stuff like that.

But it was nice to be recognized just the same.  From left to right, the overall class winners are Laurence Cohen of New Orleans, Louisiana (single canoe); Tave Lamperez of New Iberia, Louisiana, and Joey Sturm of Youngsville, Louisiana (double canoe); Tristan Gregory of Gulf Breeze, Florida (standup paddleboard); yours truly (single kayak); and Savanna Wright and Mike Herbert of Rogers, Arkansas (double kayak).  Photo by Mike Pornovets.

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Post-race adventures

The weather on the Gulf Coast was gorgeous, and I savored it after the race on Saturday.  Once the awards had been handed out, I went back to Nick's house and spent a leisurely afternoon.  When suppertime rolled around, I joined Nick and his girlfriend Kelly at a surf-and-turf joint in downtown Ocean Springs, where I had a big fried fish po-boy sandwich accompanied by a generous helping of french fries.

Later on I woke up in the middle of the night feeling rather queasy from all that fried food.  By yesterday morning I felt slightly better, but not completely in the pink.  I had a slow breakfast and let my bodily processes do their thing.

By eight thirty I felt ready to get out for some easy paddling.  On advice from Nick and Kelly, I drove over to Biloxi and put in from the public boat ramp next to the Schooner Pier Complex.  It was another beautiful day, and I decided to do a lap of Deer Island.  I wasn't sure exactly how long it would take, but I hoped I could do it in 70-90 minutes.

I wasn't terribly sore from Saturday's race, but there was definitely some stiffness in my midsection.  I tried to keep the stroke rate low and just relax and let the blood flow.  I rounded the western end of Deer Island and headed out into Mississippi Sound.  Not being a local I didn't have the clearest idea of just how big Deer Island is, but for quite a while its eastern end was nowhere in sight.  I had no particular objection to doing a long paddle other than my desire to get on the road and be home by a reasonable hour.  On and on I went, and when the end of the island finally came into view it was clear that I'd be on the water more than an hour and a half.  I rounded the point and saw my destination a good three or four miles in the distance.  I tried to stay relaxed and let the boat get there when it got there.  Finally it did get there, about 110 minutes after I'd started.  I'd be getting home a little bit later than I would have liked, but... that's okay.  Now I can tell people I've paddled around Deer Island, and that's always fun.  I didn't have my G.P.S. device turned on, so I don't know what distance I paddled yesterday, but I think I remember Nick saying it's around ten miles.

It was a warm day on the coast, but in Memphis yesterday's high was barely 60 degrees Fahrenheit.  Even as far north as Jackson the temperature was in the mid 80s, but I watched it gradually drop on my dashboard display as I continued north from there.  It was 60 degrees in DeSoto County just south of Memphis.

Anyway... it's good to be home.  What's next for me?  In terms of racing, I'm not sure.  The next race I know I'm doing is the Gorge Downwind Championships out in the Pacific Northwest, but that's not until mid July.  Right now, events within a reasonable drive of Memphis are looking scarce.  I expect I'll be settling back into some base training for a while before I ramp up the intensity again.

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A March tradition: racing in Ocean Springs

For the twelfth time in the last 13 years, racers got in their boats and assembled in the cove near the Gulf Hills Hotel this morning for the Battle On The Bayou canoe and kayak race at Ocean Springs, Mississippi.  I was pretty sure my most formidable competition would come from a pair of familiar faces in a tandem kayak.  Mike Herbert and his daughter Savanna, residents of Rogers, Arkansas, have been racing tandem for five or six seasons now, and have improved steadily.  I knew beating them would be a tall order, and as we lined up to start my plan was simply to get on their stern wake and see how long I could stay there.

A few seconds after the start I had my answer: not at all.  Mike and Savanna rocketed into the lead and had a couple of boatlengths on me before I could even sidle into position behind them.  As we turned left up into Old Fort Bayou they were steadily pulling away.

I resigned myself to a lonely morning on the race course--if I could hold off my nearest challengers, that is.  In the corner of my eye I could see the bow of a tandem surfski, and I figured it was probably the father-son team of Jeb and Thaison Berry of Gulfport, Mississippi.

I settled in and tried to keep the stroke rate at or below 80 strokes per minute.  Most of the time I was moving along at 12 kilometers per hour, and was pleasantly surprised considering the tough time I'd had in workouts maintaining that speed in pieces of 500 and 1000 meters.  The race had started at low tide, however, and I wondered how much help I was getting from rising water flowing up into the bayou.

We would be paddling up the bayou some six and a half kilometers before rounding an island and heading back down to finish where we'd started.  Up near the island there's an area where the bayou becomes braided and it's easy to make a wrong turn if you're not intimately familiar with the place.  By now Mike and Savanna were just barely in view up ahead, and I saw them follow a chute to the left.  As I got closer I realized that this looked like a place where I'd almost made a wrong turn myself in last year's race.  The only thing that saved me from that gaffe was the presence of local paddlers Jeb Berry and Nick Kinderman right behind me.

This time there were no locals nearby to set us straight, and I followed Mike and Savanna's route with no small amount of concern that we might be going the wrong way.  I rounded a tight bend to the right and discovered that I was right to be concerned: the Herberts were paddling back toward me.

Disconsolately we retraced our steps to get back on the right course.  By this time at least a half-dozen boats, mostly tandems, had caught up to us.  Mike and Savanna wasted no time sprinting back into the lead, but I found myself stuck back in seventh or eighth place, fighting to make my boat move through water churned up by no fewer than 20 paddle blades.  I was overcome with waves of anguish that my race had been ruined.

A short time later we reached the turnaround island, and I told myself to relax as we followed the narrow, shallow channel to the right of it.  There was plenty of race left to work my way past all these boats, though I wondered whether I would be able to reel in the Berrys, who were now in second place a good eight boatlengths ahead.

The channel was wider on the other side of the island where we headed back toward the start.  I found some clean water and started to move past all the many boats.  Before I knew it I was in third place and not so far behind the Berrys.  I noticed that my speed had dropped down below 11 kph, confirming my suspicion that some tidal current was at work.

I threw in a couple of surges and managed to bridge up to Jeb and Thaison.  I resolved to hang with them and conserve energy, gathering myself for what I hoped would be a strong finish in the closing kilometers. By this time the Herberts were nowhere to be seen.

We moved along patiently with me leading some and the Berrys leading some until the Washington Avenue drawbridge was in view.  The bridge is almost exactly 2000 meters from the finish.  I didn't want the race to come down to a sprint between our two boats: in that situation all bets are off with a powerful athlete like Jeb in the mix.  I decided to start pushing the pace once we were past the bridge.  But then I got a little gift: a fishing boat came zooming past to our left, sending steep waves our way.  As we dealt with the turbulent conditions I realized that Jeb and Thaison were no longer on my wake, and I knew I had to press the advantage.  I began to surge and I opened a gap.  I could still see the tandem over my right shoulder and I knew I had to keep the power on.  Memories of those painful 1000-meter pieces a few weeks ago took over my mind.  I willed myself to keep pushing a little longer as 900 meters became 800 meters and 800 meters became 700 meters.  Once I'd turned back into the cove where the finish line lay, I pushed the intensity even a little higher, the finish buoys sitting there taunting me as my thigh muscles began to throb.  Stealing a couple of glances over my shoulder, I realized that I'd widened the gap on Jeb and Thaison and with fifty meters left I let up ever so slightly to the finish.

Mike and Savanna had taken the overall title convincingly with a time of one hour, 15 minutes flat, more than four and a half minutes ahead of yours truly.  My time was 1:19:41, and the Berrys clocked 1:20:20.

Salli O'Donnell of Fort Walton Beach, Florida, was the fastest solo female finisher.  Her time of 1:22:01 was good enough for fifth place overall.  The complete results are posted here.

My G.P.S. device measured the distance at about 14.3 kilometers.  If the advertised course length of 8.5 miles (13.7 km) is accurate, then I added some 600 meters to my race with my wrong turn.  Mike and Savanna probably added an entire kilometer.  Fortunately, the final finish order was about what it would have been anyway, I think.

I'm generally pleased with how my body held up, and with the grit I showed in the last few hundred meters.  I wasn't thrilled about the spanking that Mike and Savanna laid on me, but the truth is that they're getting better and better, especially young Savanna.  Whether I'm back in vintage form is hard to say, seeing as how I didn't have much direct competition with other solo paddlers today.  One thing I know is that great racing form isn't something you can just wish yourself into; a variety of mental and physiological factors have to fall into place.  The best thing I can do is be happy with how I did today, and keep paddling and having fun with it.

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Time to do some racing again

Winter is trying its best to hang around.  The middle portion of this week was chilly and wet.  It poured down rain for much of Tuesday, so I stayed in and only did a gym session.

By Wednesday morning the rain had moved out, but it was overcast and blustery.  As I headed down to the river I was glad that this week's sessions in the boat aren't long--just 40 minutes or so.  I warmed up and did eight 12-stroke sprints at maximum intensity, starting every other minute.  I tried to start each sprint from rest so I could get some start practice, but it was hard to get the boat completely stopped the way the wind was blowing.

It stayed cool all day Thursday and into this morning.  I packed up my gear and prepared to head south.  Often when I travel down through Mississippi I stop at a river or reservoir and do a light pre-race paddle there; for a guy who paddles so exclusively on the Memphis riverfront, it's a nice change of pace.  But today I wanted to get that out of the way early rather than interrupt the drive.  I went downtown and paddled for 30 minutes in the harbor, doing six 12-stroke sprints.

I had some business to take care of in the town of Sumner, Mississippi, and from downtown Memphis it was easy to get on that old 61 Highway, a slightly more direct route to Sumner than Interstate 55.  Once I'd completed that errand I got on down to Ocean Springs as fast as I could.  It's about 10 degrees warmer down here on the Gulf Coast than it is in Memphis right now.

My friend Nick Kinderman and I had supper at an Italian restaurant and then retired to his house.  The race starts at 9 AM, so we'll be up bright and early tomorrow.  I've had a mostly-good several months of training, so we'll see how my body and brain respond.

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Monday photo feature

The year is 2010, and it's the first Battle On The Bayou canoe and kayak Race on Old Fort Bayou at Ocean Springs, Mississippi.  I'm racing alongside the team of Keith Benoist and Melissa Morrison of Natchez, Mississippi, as we approach the Washington Avenue drawbridge about two kilometers in.

The pandemic forced the cancelation of the event in 2020, but it's otherwise occurred every year since 2010, and I've made it down there every time.  Driving down to the Gulf Coast just feels like the thing to do at this time each year.  I intend to be back there for the 2022 edition this Saturday.

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An ache here, a pain there, and a race in a week

I did a gym session Friday morning.  My left deltoid is still quite sore and I have no idea where the strain came from.  I doesn't really interfere with paddling, but it's an unpleasant thing to walk around with.

Meanwhile, it's been a few years now since I suffered from plantar fasciitis in my right foot.  I think it was around 2018 that I went through a treatment protocol at my chiropractor's office that cleared it up very nicely.  But in the last day or so I've had a hint of pain down there again.  I sure hope I'm not headed for another ordeal like that.

Yesterday morning wasn't too cold--it was around 50 degrees Fahrenheit--but it was mostly cloudy and breezy when I got down to the river.  I warmed up and did three 8-stroke sprints, and then did a set of twelve 30-second sprints starting every 3rd minute.  It took me a while to get fully warmed up to the task, and the first few sprints felt hard.  But I started finding a groove by the sixth or seventh one, and liked how I was moving the boat a week before my next race.

The sun came out while I was on the water and by yesterday afternoon the weather was quite nice.  This morning it was bright and sunny and warming up toward a high in the mid 70s.  It felt good to get back in the boat and paddle steady and calm, and smooth everything back out after yesterday's sprints.  This coming week I plan to do a few short sprints but otherwise get plenty of rest.

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The hardest race prep is over for now

My first North American race of the year is fast approaching: it's a week from this Saturday at Ocean Springs, Mississippi.  Several weeks ago, when I hit a low point in my energy level and quality of training, I questioned whether I should stick with my plan to go; but I've been feeling much better since then and I think I will.

On Tuesday I did a gym session and then headed down to the river for my last hard pace workout before the race.  After warming up and doing three 8-stroke sprints, I commenced with twelve 250-meter pieces, starting every 4th minute.  My target pace was a little over 12 kilometers per hour (7.5 miles per hour), and I tried to keep the stroke rate under 90 strokes per minute.  The wind was uncharacteristically calm for this time of year, meaning I could get some reliable data from my G.P.S. device.  The workout was tough but never seemed insurmountable.  I had a nice endorphin high going by the time I was back on the dock.

We had a rainy afternoon on Tuesday, but the sun started coming out yesterday, and today was mostly sunny with a Fahrenheit high in the 70s.  I was very happy to go down to the river and paddle a relaxing 60 minutes during which I just enjoyed the nice day and got some blood flowing through my muscles.

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Monday photo feature

I took this picture of my boat on a snowy dock in December of 2012.  The scene was quite similar this past weekend.  The snow fell Friday night and I stayed in on Saturday, and then when I paddled yesterday there was about this amount of snow still on the dock.

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Another winter blast (I hope it's the last)

It was lovely outside Friday morning: sunny skies with a temperature around 50 degrees Fahrenheit.  But the weather was expected to make an abrupt turn for the worse from lunchtime on, so I wasted no time doing a gym session and getting myself down to the river.  The north wind was already picking up by the time I was on the water.  I warmed up paddling to the north end of the harbor, doing a set of three 8-stroke sprints along the way, and then commenced my workout: ten 30-second sprints starting every third minute.  I was straining a bit in the last several reps but I otherwise held up well.

The sky had clouded over by the time I returned to the dock, and the temperature was dropping.  That continued through the afternoon, and in the early evening the precipitation began.  I'd been expecting mostly rain that would turn into some kind of frozen mess once the temperature dropped below freezing, but instead it was a sure-enough blanket of snow.

I knew the snow wouldn't be sticking around long: yesterday was bright and sunny and a little above freezing, and today's forecast called for a temperature well over 50 degrees.  But I was glad just the same to stick around home and busy myself with indoor activities yesterday.  I patted myself on the back for getting my paddling in on Friday.

It was still below 40 degrees when I got in the boat this morning, but with the sun shining I knew the temperature would rise fast.  What I didn't expect was just how windy it would be: it was blowing hard out of the south.  My original plan was to paddle up the Mississippi to the mouth of the Wolf River, and continue up the Wolf to the Danny Thomas Boulevard bridge before coming back.  But out on the Mississippi the conditions were choppy and confused, and I found myself getting much wetter than I care to be on a chilly morning.  About halfway up the Greenbelt Park I decided to turn around and do the rest of the session in the harbor.  Back in the harbor boredom became my main nemesis.  At least I had the wind at my back from the mouth to the north end, and I tried to keep my speed over 10 kilometers per hour while taking less than 70 strokes per minute.  Once I reached the north end and turned back south it became a slog into the wind, and I just tried to keep my stroke rate the same.  I labored on until I'd been in the boat for two hours, and called it a morning.

By this time it had warmed up over 50 degrees, but the wind chill was acute as I changed into dry clothes. I felt just as worn out as I do when I paddle to Danny Thomas and back or around the Loosahatchie Bar.  I was chilled to the core and would spend the rest of the day warming back up.

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Internal chemistry seems okay

I've received my lab results from the doctor's office and it appears that my testosterone, thyroid, and P.S.A. (prostate specific antigen) levels are normal.  That's good news, of course, but I remain puzzled as to why I've had less giddy-up in the boat in the last year or so.  Maybe the training I did under Maks last year just wasn't right for me.  Or maybe I'm just getting old and slowing down.

I will note that for the last week I've been feeling a bit better.  I felt strong while paddling last Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.  And Tuesday I had my most encouraging workout in quite a while.  I did eight 500-meter pieces, starting every 6th minute, with a target pace of 12.0 kilometers per hour (about 7.5 miles per hour).  While I may have been biting off too much with those 1000-meter pieces I did several weeks in a row last month, Tuesday's workout was good and taxing but I never doubted that I would finish out the session as strong as I'd begun it.

I also did a gym session Tuesday morning.  I skipped the pull-ups again because my left deltoid is still sore.  I don't know what I might have done to make it that way.

This morning I paddled steady for 60 minutes.  The weather was beautiful, but that won't last: Saturday is supposed to be bitter cold.  I may move Saturday's paddling session up to tomorrow.

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Monday photo feature

In the 2006 Outdoors, Inc., Canoe and Kayak Race, I had a pretty good lead on Eric Mims of Hermitage, Tennessee, as we entered the harbor.  But Eric outsprinted me over the last 600 meters to the finish line.  This was the first time I had seen Eric paddling a surfski--he had previously paddled outrigger canoes--and it was the first indication that he was going to be pretty good at it.

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Some over-distance and some stroke work

Yesterday morning the Fahrenheit temperature was in the mid 60s, rising toward a high in the high 70s.  I decided it was a good day for a lap around the Loosahatchie Bar.  In general, completing this course (starting and finishing at Harbortown Marina) in less than two hours is a solid effort.  I did it yesterday in one hour, 55 minutes, 37 seconds.  That includes a couple of lost minutes right at the beginning when I got a stick caught in my rudder and had to return to the dock to remove it.  With the river flowing at 30.3 feet on the Memphis gauge, the course was a bit shorter than it was three weeks ago when I made the circumnavigation at 19.1 feet: the distance averages around 20.4 kilometers (12.65 miles), but yesterday I measured it at 19.7 km (12.24 mi.).  So that could be the reason for my faster time, but an offsetting factor was a strong south wind that slowed me down as I paddled downriver.  The Mississippi's water is cold this time of year, and I paddled defensively in the bumpy conditions to avoid icy splashes and especially a swim.

It was warm and windy again this morning, and after taking a lot of tense, choppy strokes yesterday I elected to stay mostly in the harbor today and concentrate on paddling smooth and relaxed for 60 minutes.  This weekend I've continued to feel a bit more pep in my step than I had earlier in the week.

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Hoping to find some answers

Longtime readers of this blog know that in the last year and a half or so I've dealt with a general feeling of sluggishness: not much power, not much energy, not much giddy-up... I've felt listless in the boat, and in the flatwater distance races that make up my schedule in this part of the country, athletes I'd always been competitive with have been leaving me in the dust.

This issue has re-asserted itself in recent weeks.  Last week I chalked it up to the miserable weather, but on a beautiful Tuesday morning this week, I felt as impotent as ever.  As I labored through a gym session and then tried to do a set of ten 30-second sprints in the boat (I stopped after five), my physical ennui combined with thoughts of "Why am I even doing this?"  That might be the worst part of phases like this: I can't tell how much of it is a genuine physical problem and how much of it is just in my head.

A couple of friends--most notably my buddy Rob in New York, a chiropractor who specializes in nutrition and general wellness--have suggested that my testosterone level might be low.  A quick Google query tells me that common symptoms of low testosterone include fatigue, loss of muscular strength, moodiness and irritability, depressed mood, and decreased sense of well-being.  I can check all those boxes at least some of the time lately.  I've mentioned that my weight has been below normal, and maybe decreased muscle mass is accountable for that.

Whatever the case, on Tuesday I decided it was time to confront whatever is going on with me physically.  I hate dealing with doctors' offices, and of course it seems like I've been to mine a lot lately because of my annual physical in November and a PCR test for travel to South Africa in January, but I went ahead and made an appointment.  They got me in yesterday morning.  The doctor wasn't entirely convinced that low testosterone is to blame--she said men with that condition typically gain weight.  She said a couple of other things worth checking are my thyroid level and my P.S.A. (prostate specific antigen).  I bled out some blood so the lab techs can check all those things.

It'll take about a week to get the results, so all I can do now is try to keep on moving.  This morning I did another gym session, though I skipped the second set of pull-ups because they were putting a lot of stress on my left deltoid that's been sore for at least the last month (I've had too many other worries to mention it here before now).  Then I went to the river.  The gorgeous weather has continued all week, and I felt a lot better in the boat today than I did on Tuesday.  Maybe taking a couple of days completely off helped, or maybe I'm feeling more upbeat mentally now that I've taken steps to find out what's going on in my body.  I did a pretty strong 60-minute paddle and enjoyed the nice morning.

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