Surfski Knowledge Base

Larry Goolsby
12/22/07 #3919

Thia story is a great example on why we need to practice rescue
skills, even if it is just rescuing ourselves. Erik B. emailed me
over a month ago about doing a swim (New Year's day?) in order to
test how our drysuits/wetsuits will protect us against the cold. I
have been trying to think of how we could do some sort of race
(swimming?) and this recent rescue has given me an idea. What if we
did a race on the bay going from point A to Point B with one person
in a surfski and another in a drysuit? We could drop a buoy off of
Marine park and have teams of two. You would leave the beach with
your 'swimmer' and do the best to drag them out to the buoy and back
again. Maybe we could con Dale into bringing her Zodiac out just in
case we need assistance. New Year's is 10 days away, any takers? Any
better ideas?
LG

New Year's Day Swim/Paddle…………
Larry Goolsby
12/23/07 #3925

All right, it sounds like we need to do this. On New Year's day, the
highest tide is between 10 am and noon so in order to allow a couple of
the late nighters to sleep in, let's do this at 10 am. If you don't
have a drysuit, you can be a paddler (you can do the swim in a
wetsuit). I'll bring a buoy that we can anchor about 50-100 yards off
shore and come up with a prize for the winning team. A LeMans style
start would be nice followed by each team paddling/dragging themselves
out around the buoy and back. Outriggers would be welcome…..
LG

New Year Days race
kathleen petereit
12/26/07 #3941

Larry G,

Seeing as your are head coach and owner of the the BCKC facilities, for
your New Year Day race I thought in order for everyone to get the
towing experience, once you get to the bouy you should have the paddler
dump and have swimmer mount and tow back. Although at this point
swimmer may be unable to grip the paddle.

Hmmmmmm might be a lot of new drysuits out on that day ??????

With the exception of Heather and Brandon. Baby HB may not appreciate
this manoeuver and would probably want mom to stay in the boat ! Hope
you have a photographer there….

:) Kathleen

Re: New Year Days race
Larry Goolsby
12/27/07 #3942

Kathleen…..Switching off at the buoy has already been a point to
ponder. The only problem is some paddlers might be significantly
different from each other: wide seat vs. narrow seat, left hand
feather vs. right hand feather, long legs (Brandon) vs. short legs
(everyone else). We'll have to see who shows up and decide what kind
of rules we need in order to complicate things. I have accumulated a
box-o-beer (that oughta get the Canadians down here) for the winning
team. This could be fun if it wasn't in the middle of winter.
Larry G.
— In whatcompaddlers@…, “island_hukigirl”
<island_hukigirl@…> wrote:

Larry G

Re: New Year Days race
Reivers Dustin
12/27/07 #3943

A good thing to put out here up-front is that quitting is a great
option. It's counter to a lot of programming. For instance go there
and decide that the water looks funny. Or whatever.

Reading about Kathleen's experimental work makes me think hard about
setting the buoy as the turning mark. (I'm planing to be one of the
swimmers.)

Hopefully we'll get some extra paddlers to just do the route without
draging a body around so we have some back-up guys. And now that I
think of it, I remember Brian B in his outrigger getting my daughter
out of a jam on a Wednesday nighter a few years ago. Can we get any
outrigger paddlers into this?

RD

Sea Kayaker Magazine…
Brandon Nelson <brandon@…>
12/28/07 #3944

We just got the February ’08 issue of Sea Kayaker Magazine In yesterday’s mail, and after flipping through it to browse the articles, I was struck by how timely and ironic the subject matter is with all that the group has been experiencing and talking about lately.

First, there’s a phenomenal feature article on “Cold Shock” – the ugly, much quicker-killing relative of hypothermia. Part of what is explained by the uber-qualified author is that, whereas hypothermia kills after 30 minutes, cold shock kills in 3-5 minutes. Rather than try to summarize any more of the article, let me just copy the author’s bio here:

Chris Brooks is a physician, scientist and inventor. He is the director of research and development at Survival Systems Ltd. Darmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada, and is an adjunct professor in the faculty of health and human performance at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia. Chris wrote the report “Survival in Cold Water – Staying Alive” in 2003 for the Marine Safety Directorate of Transport Canada.

Needless to say, I found the in-depth article absolutely profound.

Next, in the safety section, there is a first-hand account of a “World Class Athlete” who attempted to cross Lake Michigan width-wise from Michigan to Wisconsin. He lived… but Good God, you’ve got to read the story. Here’s a pertinent excerpt to ponder with all our recent discussion of VHFs and EPIRBS…

From the captain of the commercial vessel who rescued him: “We heard nothing on our radio – in fact, the guys took the EPIRB off your life jacket and even though the red light was flashing and beeper was beeping, it wasn’t transmitting.”

And… the “Strategy” feature in the issue is titled, of all things, “Strategies for Towing.”

Got an extra $5 laying around? Definitely a worthy investment.

Brandon

New Year's Day swim and paddle……
Larry Goolsby
12/30/07 #3952

Marine Park at 10 am on Tuesday. Dress for immersion if you are a
swimmer. On Saturday after our trip to Govornor's point and back, I
hopped in the water (tripped on my leash) and decided to swim around. I
was wearing a drysuit with very little insulation underneath and a pfd.
Within a couple of minutes (1 or 2) my legs cramped up. I was still
able to backfloat and do a straight legged kick but swimming in a
drysuit is not easy. Bring your boat and best winter garb. For those of
you that use Pogies, I suggest bringing gloves. My hands went numb in
just a few minutes without anything covering them.
Larry G.

shrinkage regatta
Reivers Dustin
01/01/08 #3957

What a blast. Four boats competed in the madness. I was dressed
like a polar bear and could barely paddle. Before the race we all
paddled out to the Post Point Bouy. I remember watching LB become
this tiny dot out there thinking, “damn, that's a long far ways!” So
we set our course turn mark about 100 yards from the beach. It was
set up so the course was near shore so anyone could swim over and
haul out on the rocks. We had Erik and Brian along with their OC-1's
and it was flat-calm conditions. With those two watching everyone's
back it really took the pressure off.
Everyone started communicating with their partners, even before
the “race”. We all dialed in to what was working and what didn't.
If you check the photo's you can see that people on back were trying
to eliminate draging in the water. The paddlers figured out that
they needed to arm-paddle and forget the vertical paddle technique.
Balance was a whole new thing. When I was on back it helped to raise
the high-side foot or leg to bring the boat upright. When I followed
my instincts and lowered the low side leg it didn't help much and
really slowed the boat. When I tried to get totally clear of the
water the boat got really unstable. There are some non-intuitive
things about being a passenger on a single-seat surfski.
Actually there are many things I'm trying to evaluate about the
experience. Maybe the biggest surprise is how fast we could go. All
four teams were right up front moving well. LG is talking about
actually doing a one-mile course out to the Post Point Bouy. It's do-
able. Afterwards most of us fooled around in the water trying out
swimming, other ways of being towed, towing two people, swimming your
boat in, …

One more thing: I was dressed too heavy for an enjoyable paddle.
Based on this experience I don't need as much under my drysuit to
give myself some safety margin. But this is one single data point in
an experiment that needs lots more data. Like LB said we need to do
this in more severe conditions.

I'm curious how that would have been in a wetsuit.

RD

Re: shrinkage regatta
kathleen petereit
01/01/08 #3958

It's interesting that you could move the ski's at a good pace. When I
had the young man that we rescued he felt like a dead weight and we
inched forward it seemed. I had to use every ounce of my strength to
get 40 yrds. However I had to keep my feet out for balance and he had
no strength. I think he just flopped on the back and didn't have the
energy to lift his legs which caused a lot of drag.

Good on you guys for practising ! Maybe an official rescue race this
summer in Vancouver should be put into the schedule….Bob and
Jeff….what do you think ???? Might be incentive to have more people
practise.

Kathleen

Re: shrinkage regatta
Larry Goolsby
01/01/08 #3959

I was the most surprised at how fast we could paddle with a body on
the back of the ski. Before we started, I figured that the buoy being
100 yards away was too far and that this was going to be an exercise
in futility. We did a LeMonds style start from the beach and it only
took us a few minutes to get to the buoy. At the buoy, the rule was
that you had to dismount (both passengers and paddlers) and then
remount before continuing to the finish. This was actually a fun race
because in order to gain speed, the passenger had to raise their
limbs out of the water to reduce drag. This severly raised the center
of gravity and the boat became unstable. Eric G. paddled his OC-1
next to Shaun and I and clocked us at about 4 mph. The 100 yards (200
round trip) seemed way to short after we finished and we will have to
extend the distance the next time we do this. Today the water was
really calm and made this an easy exercise. We need to try this out
in some chop and see how we do. I plan on making this an annual New
Year's event with longer distances.
For those of you that didn't partake, you missed out on fun event
that was really educational and entertaining. I was the passenger
behind Shaun and my hands and feet were not cold at the end of the
200 yard dash. Shaun and I switched places and did the 200 yards a
second time. This event raised my level of confidence but ruined my
self esteem after Caroline/Leann beat us to the finish. We'll kick
their asses next year….
Larry G.

Re: shrinkage regatta
Shane Baker
01/01/08 #3960

Happy New Year everyone. While you B'ham paddlers were playing “Tow
the Dummy,” seven of us raced 12 miles around Fox Island. Don K
kicked arse. I'll see if I can get results posted on Noteboard on the
SR website. I, being the wise old man and race director, picked the
direction that we raced. I made the wrong choice. The tide was
supposed to be full at the bridge at 11:30am, that is, incoming, but
it was apparent that it was going out at 10:10, the time we got
going. So much for predictions. I use
http://www.saltwatertides.com/dynamic.dir/washingtonsites.html for
info. The wind was a headwind all the way around. I have never
figured out why it is that rounding an island that the apparent wind
always blows in your face. I have paddled around Fox Island perhaps
100+ times over the years and today I totally screwed up the choice
of direction. My bad.
Little bit about towing. Thirty years ago we used to practice towing
each other in sea kayaks in case one of us had an injury that prevent
us from reaching our destination. Towing another boat with an
occupant is hard work even with a river kayakers sling and throw rope
tied around one's waist. Today, towing a surfski is out of the
question as none of them have an attachment point on the area of the
bow for a tow rope. Some of the early ones used to have a substantial
bow loop which was great for towing. In some of the early races
across Puget Sound, before Sound Rowers became a club, the race
directors would recruit tow boats to drag us to the start. The Eagle
Harbor Yacht club liked to help and I've been part of a chain of 25
kayaks, rowboats and surfskis being towed across the Sound. Seems to
me that if you are in conditions where you may loose your ski and
require a tow then you probably should have had a tether and not be
in that situation in the first place.
The more serious stuff. About 10 years ago, maybe more, at the Gap
to Gap Relay race in Yakima, I was involved in a body recovery in the
fishing pond in the Sportman State Park. I had just returned to the
Park after running the river leg of the Relay on the day before the
race when a young man ran over, stopped me, and asked if I could help
find a ranger who had disappeared in the pond. Long story short, the
19 year old Ranger had walked into the fishing pond to try to rescue
a duck that had eaten the bait on a kids fishing line. The Ranger had
drowned. The dive team who lost 4 of their members earlier in the
year in an irrigation canal showed up and found the Ranger on the
bottom of the pond. They laid him across the back deck of my Valhalla
Victory surfski and I paddled him 200 yards to shore. He was totally
limp and it was probably the toughest 200 yards I have ever paddled.
It was like towing a 5 gallon bucket tied to a rope. Balance wasn't
a problem, nor was the water and air temperature. Had that been out
in the middle of Bellingham Bay at this time of year, there may have
been two victims.
I'm not sure the rear deck of my 23lb Huki will stand the weight of a
200lb person laying across it and you are not going to last long in
the water. It seems very basic to me that you not get in a position
where you lose a boat and need a tow. I had better not paddle with
anyone who is likely to lose their ski I guess.
Shane.