Another picture taken by Lee as we left Dreadnaught at 7.30. I really like this one. It's the Marines boys just behind us who eventually flew past us on the Tideway.
Had a week off repairing myself but went for a small run yesterday, but having a big mojo dip at the moment. I guess it's to be expected after the exertions of last weekend. I'd quite like to get back in a boat but I'm not sure my coccyx has quite recovered.
This is a long one, so get yourself a cup of tea first.....
Pre-race
This was to be my third start in the DW with one completed attempt at the Senior Doubles in 2010 and one retirement in 2011 after 17 hours. Adam and I had been training together since the summer of 2010 so the best part of two years were behind this latest attempt. For Adam, it was to be his last attempt so we wanted to ensure that we knocked it on the head this year. We had been let down by our technique in the past so the focus over the winter had been to do plenty of technique work rather than just concentrating on distance. Like many people, we had not been able to do as many big sessions as we would have liked but all in all, we went into this race feeling better prepared and more confident than in 2011. That said we desperately wanted to get this right and complete, with so much effort having gone into it. However, the DW Gods could still have the last laugh.
I spent the four days before the race on holiday so Adam was left sorting out the final nitty gritty. Extra torches, lots of food, more base layers, extra socks; we probably went a bit nuts in those last couple of days, not wanting to leave anything to chance. Dad, who was going to be support crew with John from Devizes to Dreadnaught had gone back down to recce the portages again during the week to ensure that they were comfortable with the meeting points. On Good Friday we loaded up and travelled down and when we arrived at the Travelodge we made the final preparations to the boat before we headed off to the kit check. It was here we discovered that we didn’t have the Garmin despite much rummaging around. I had written a thorough checklist and had ticked it off into a box, but could I find it? Bah, we’d just have to do without.
DevizesWharf was nice and quite and after hanging around for our slot we got a marshal to check things over and all was good. It was only afterwards Dad told us that the other marshals were all standing around Sir Steve’s boat that was having his kit checked as well. Anyway, we went off to get our race number and safety bracelets crimped on and as we came out we bumped into Steve so we took the opportunity to wish him luck. He’d probably need as much as anyone else who starts the DW. We trooped off into town for a meal and then it was back to the Travelodge and in bed by 9.30 for a wake up.
Let’s go
After the worse continental breakfast I have ever had, ever, we got down to the wharf by and got our boat straight to the front. We bimbled around, used the portaloos, had some food and then decided to get on the water with 10 minutes to go. We spent a very uncomfortable time trying to keep relaxed and stationary while the clock ticked down. Eventually I took pity on Adam and held onto a narrow boat while a C2 crew decided to create waves. Thanks a bunch.
We got away at just gone 7 and for the first 10 minutes were in 3rd place in the DW. J We took a while to settle down and relax and thankfully not many crews were coming past us so there was not too much wash for us to contend with and it was just a case of finding our rhythm and getting those first couple of hours done. At Honey Streetwe took fresh bottles and carried on towards Pewsey and the first of our portages.
Capsize and Crofton
At Pewsey we were already over 10 minutes up on schedule; we felt really comfortable and relaxed but Dad and John urged us to cool our jets. We didn’t feel that we were pushing at all and I had thought beforehand that a small buffer might be useful later on. As we left I thought about our pace and effort level and it seemed spot on so we continued on. We approached the Savernake Tunnel with a couple of crews ahead of us but we had a horrible transition through. I zigzagged all over the place and we felt particularly wobbly. Of the four times Adam and I have been through it was by far our worst go and as we came out we could see that the couple of crews ahead whom we had been keeping pace with were now more than 200 metres further ahead. A short while after Savernake we had a capsize. There was absolutely no reason for it as it was a particularly benign piece of water. Thankfully the water was not cold which could have well caused us to become tense so we emptied the boat pretty quickly and got back in. The rudder didn’t seem right but on inspection all seemed okay but when we got going again the rudder was stiffer than before. After a couple of minutes a C2 crew removed a piece of weed which they could see poking out and immediately it felt better. The capsize really annoyed us at the time but with hindsight I think it helped. We focussed more and were more relaxed in the boat determined that would be our only one. It seemed that our time buffer was already coming in useful. A big shout out goes to the crews who went past as we sorted ourselves out. Every single one checked we were ok and offered support. Thank you. J
We took the Crofton flight much more steadily using more walking breaks and we paddled one of the longer pounds so that we would keep our heart rates down and able to digest our food. With a couple of the bigger and more iconic obstacles out of the way it was now time to get our portaging as smooth as possible as we headed towards Newbury. About an hour out of Newbury I noticed the first signs of an ache in my right wrist. Although it’s common for peoples’ controlhands and wrists to fatigue and is a common cause for retirement it is not an injury that I have suffered before. I started to be much more careful in opening my hand to alleviate it, but of course it immediately started to play on my mind. I just hoped that the nurofen would be able to control it for the rest of the race and stop it from getting worse.
We arrived at Newbury, still 5 minutes up so we decided to get out of our wet tops as we were starting to cool off and we felt a lot better for this. Dad and John had some tea and coffee for us and after that we felt happier and good to go.
Swing bridges
Portage at Burghfield
Adam was looking really good, well, as good as he’ll ever look. ;-) I could tell that his confidence was high, which was really encouraging for the rest of the paddle on the canal. A couple of the swing bridges were open but the last one was quite low. I thought we could do it and initially so did Adam. We paddled hard at it and I got my head down only to hear Adam shout “No!” and the boat came to a complete stop with me under the bridge and Adam holding the front of it. Doh. We managed to inch our way over to the edge where Adam could get under it also as we pushed ourselves through. The people standing along the bridge were quite surprised to see us emerge unscathed and dry. During this section we were receiving a lot of support from Bob, as well as Dad and John, as his crew, Laurence and Lesley were just behind us. Bob was great, giving us loads of encouragement and as I turned round I found my mouth crammed with a jaffa cake and a slurp of energy drink before I had time to refuse it. He was a top bloke, popping up at various points along the route giving us advice. We saw Laurence and Lesley a few times at a couple of portages and they were finding it tough. Their day was made harder by a problem with their rudder which cost them some time and after that we didn’t see them again. Unfortunately, they didn’t finish, retiring at Shiplake, but I am sure that they will learn from it and come back stronger next year.
Leaving Burghfield
As usual, our portaging became a bit more clumsy and haphazard as we got tired. At one portage we decided to get out at a low grass bank instead of the higher portage point. As a result I found myself face-planting into some stinging nettles and had a numb forehead for an hour or two. Unfortunately, that was not the only thing going numb. My right hand was steadily getting worse again and I was finding it painful to open it, which meant I gripped the paddle all the time making it worse. All of a sudden I had a shooting pain down the inside of my wrist which made me stop paddling straight away. We were both worried and I immediately started telling myself not to panic. I could tell Adam was concerned and I just couldn’t believe that we may be dropping out before we had even got off the canal. We were still comfortably on schedule so we soft paddled for a bit, determined to not let the situation get out of control. It was great to have a quick chat with Hodge at Burghfield lock, who had come down from the midlands to offer his support and then we saw Bob for the last time at Fobney as he led us down to the get-in. I ended up knee high in mud instead of in the boat but eventually we were on our way, covering the last few miles to Dreadnaught.
Dreadnaught came into sight and we were bang-on schedule. We had lost the 10 minutes we had in hand from the first pound, but all in all it had gone well. We met up with a good crowd. Mum had come down with Adam’s Mum and Colin and Phil and Alex were there ready to take over from Dad and John. We got dry kit on and had some hot soup, coffee and a sausage sandwich. We said bye to Dad and John. They had been brilliant. While the adrenalin had been pumping for us they had been calm and reassuring and been a great support team. They were now able to head home for a well deserved rest.
All in all we were there for 20 minutes and set off feeling pretty good. Adam looked fresh and determined while I secretly worried about my wrist. I had a feeling that it was going to be a particularly long night.
The Thames
Leaving Dreadnaught
So we were now on the Thames and able to get our heads down and pick up some speed. While there was very little flow I was expecting the greatly more spread out portages would allow us to pick up our average speed. In the back of his mind, Adam’s big intermediate goal was to get to Marlow in order to get past where we had bailed last year and we were confident that this was now in the bag, but my wrist was getting worse again. We had a couple of short pounds to Sonning and Shiplake before we met up with Alex and Phil at Marsh. When we got there I got them to strap my wrist up with duck tape (is there nothing that can’t be fixed with it?) It helped to support it just enough to take the edge off of the soreness but I could tell that this was a situation that was only going to get worse. We began switching from cold food to predominantly hot food. Towards the end of the canal I had reached new depths of culinary ghastliness; 2 mini scotch eggs, a jaffa cake and 3 jelly babies in one go. I think with my skinny neck that I must have looked like a boa constrictor digesting a sheep, swallowing that lot. My favourite during the night became Heinz tinned spaghetti that Alex heated up and spooned into me. I normally can’t stand the stuff but I found it really easy to eat and filling. Adam was on coffee, chocolate raisins and soup which the boys kept coming throughout the night.
We started losing time as we approached Hurley and it was a combination of two things. Firstly, our portaging was taking longer as we got food inside us but more worryingly we had to stop on the water every 10 minutes or so for me to rest my wrist. I would take the opportunity to dip my hand and forearm into the water hoping that the cold water might help keep the swelling down and reduce the discomfort but there was no doubt in my mind that we were potentially going to be out the race. Adam was getting tired but was still in good shape and at Marlow we were 40 minutes down on schedule but half of those were from the Dreadnaught stop, so things were still looking pretty good, all in all. We were keeping up with the crews around us when we were actually paddling but it was the constant stopping which was causing us to gradually lose ground.
The length of time that we were paddling became shorter and shorter. I was using the micro-chunking technique to break it down as much as possible. We’d paddle to a tree, a light, a bridge, whatever landmark that looked about 5 minutes away and then have a quick break while I dunked my wrist.
Cookham proved eventful. We couldn’t see Phil at first, standing by the pub so we lost a bit of time coming back to pick up a feed and we then went and paddled into the weir stream instead of towards Boulters. In all we lost a good 7 or 8 minutes there. The next few hours were a real struggle. I was becoming increasingly concerned about my wrist and discomfort was now moving well and truly into pain territory while Adam’s control wrist was also seizing up and he was looking increasingly fatigued. Slowly but surely, our extra time in hand slipped away as our portaging slowed drastically. We were letting faster crews through which was fine but that was costing us time that we didn’t have. On the water, we were still paddling well despite having to rest my wrist every 10 minutes or so. We had a couple of crews who put in the water in front of us having caught us up and we were comfortably keeping pace with them. One crew we held onto for over an hour only losing them when we stopped at another portage. We were able to use these episodes to gee ourselves up and give ourselves confidence that we could still make Teddington by 8 o’ clock.
I can’t remember how it happened but as we went through Old Windsor and Bell I got my calculations wrong. By this time it was . I must have asked a marshal how far it was to Teddington. I had then done some maths (not my strongest subject at the best of times) and deduced that there was no way we were going to make Teddington by . As we paddled towards Bell I broke the news to Adam. We’d given it a go but it wasn’t going to happen. Adam was looking very tired and my right hand was literally a claw on the paddle shaft. I genuinely felt that it was over. We pulled the boat out and Phil came running up, telling us that we had not lost any time on the last 2 pounds. We told him that we were not going to make Teddington and that we were going to call it a day. Phil looked at us like we were nuts. “What do you mean, you’ve still got 40 minutes spare?” Adam and I just looked at each other. We had decided that if there was still a chance of making Teddington by 8 then we simply had to carry on but I have to say it took a lot of mental strength from Adam to get back into the mystere. He was beginning to hurt and daybreak was still a long way off, but we were now paddling on a much more familiar part of the course. We just had to keep ticking off pounds and hopefully Teddington would be in the bag but we would have to be much quicker with our portaging and feeding.
We got to Shepperton at 5.26 which in theory should have been plenty of time but the weather was deteriorating. Adam was going off his food so at Molesey I was literally popping chocolate raisins into his mouth like coins into a slot machine in order to help him keep some calories going in. I got a piece of steak pastie from a supporter for another crew which was absolute heaven before we headed off on the last pound with 4 other crews down to Teddington. We had 75 minutes for the last pound. We normally do it comfortably in 45 but it was going to be a very close run thing. I can honestly say that over those hours between Penton and Teddington we were genuinely racing, trying to stay in the race. Again, we had to take it in sections; get to Ravens Ait, rest; to KingstonBridge, then teapot island and finally Teddington lock. There was a big crowd of supporters for us there and the adrenalin was really pumping. The last 10 hours or so had been really hard and at many times it had seemed likely that we wouldn’t get there. We were the second to last boat through Teddington and we made it through with 4 minutes to spare. I celebrated by having a little cry.
The Tideway
The tideway from 2010 is blotted from my mind. I now know why. It’s bloody horrible. We got going again with fresh bottles and a bag of food in the bottom of the boat and we paddled steadily down to Richmond where we had to portage the half lock. There were 3 other crews there and we stood around chatting. I don’t think any of us felt particularly inclined to get back in the boats and we were on a bit of a high knowing that we were on the final leg and that Westminster was at least theoretically, in the bag, but I was also conscious that we were on borrowed time with us starting this section so late into the tide window. There was mud everywhere. I’m not particularly prissy but it was pretty nasty and I realised that there was mud in the tube of my drink bottle which meant I was not to have any fluids for the next few hours.
By now Adam’s back and shoulders were suffering and my coccyx was really sore and while we were making good progress on the water, paddling with the C2 crew that we had been with at Richmond, Adam was having to get out of the boat often in order to stretch. I was getting tetchy as I just wanted to make progress and that’s hard to do when the boat is stationary on the shore. We must have stopped 4 or 5 times with every stop costing us at least 7 to 8 minutes. We had lost 2 of the crews that we started the tideway with but we were constantly swapping places with the C2 crew as we made our way through South West London and into the centre of town. The traffic was not too bad; we had a few rowers to deal with but they were all really friendly with one of the support vessels even giving us a gee-up through his megaphone.
The real problems started with a few miles still to go. Unbeknown to us the tide had turned and with that we started to get some pretty big washes to contend with, the worst ones being those thrown up by the safety boats as they rushed down river. We just hoped that the crews behind were ok and had not got themselves into too much trouble. By this time we were crawling along the bank just to ensure that we stayed upright and Adam saved us from a capsize caused by another wave. We were both running on empty when Westminster came into view but it didn’t seem to be getting closer. I estimate that it took us well over 20 minutes to cover the last mile or so as the tide was now beginning to flow back upstream and we had very little left to actually move the boat forward. The last couple of hundred metres we could here our families shouting and cheering and they couldn’t understand why we kept dropping our paddles; we just had very little left. The rib told us to go through the second arch.
“Not the first arch?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“There’s no water in it.”
That might be a problem then. So the last 100 metres, and I paddled while Adam supported. As we went under the bridge and steered to the steps I just felt completely done in; I was more spent than any other time I could remember. Two lovely chaps helped me out the boat and up the steps, both promising me that I’d be back to do it again and when I got to the top I just burst into tears. I felt pretty silly especially as I was faced with dozens of tourists looking on with completely bemused faces and taking pictures while I cried and hugged Adam. I have never felt relief like it. After all that effort that we had put in over the last 2 years we had finally been able to complete the DW. It was every bit as special as the first time I did it with Jamie.
The last 10 metres
Being helped up the steps.
Jones and Kew; 28hrs 40 mins 87th /161
Aftermath
The aches and pains have subsided although I still have a bit of numbness in my right hand, and my coccyx, well, let’s not go there. Mind you, I really don’t mind, I am just so pleased that I was able to help Adam get to the end and complete this very special race. If you’re thinking of doing it; do it. You’ll never regret it. It might take you a while but it will be so worth it. But join a club and learn to paddle a boat first. Trust me, it’ll help. ;-) Adam’s on holiday so I’m not sure how he’s healing up, but like me, I’m sure that he’s not botheredand he can bask in the knowledge he’s done something very special. I found our Garmin in one of the boxes when we got back home. I knew I'd packed it.
Thank You to;
Dad, John, Alex and Phil – Simply brilliant. Upbeat, unflappable, funny and prepared. We simply could not have done it without you and we could not have asked for a better support team.
Bob – Without his help and guidance with our technique this year I do not think that we would have finished this year. Cheers mate.
Lee – Thanks so much for coming down to cheer us on, the documents you lent us and the never ending good vibes. Cheers mate.
Organisers, marshals, supporters; THANK YOU.
One last thing……
For most of the race we were leap-frogging with these guys. They were simply awesome. It’s rather hard to feel sorry for yourself when you are paddling behind a triple amputee. Inspirational doesn’t do the word justice and although they don’t know it, they played a big part in us finishing this thing. If you’ve got a spare £5, go onto their just giving site and give it to them. They have really earned it.
A couple of K1 paddles this week with me getting quite nicely toasted on the back of my neck and a k2 paddle with Adam tonight; again, just an hour splashing up and down the Kingston straight. But this week has mainly been packing, writing lists, writing new portage instructions (lost the old ones but now have new, better ones) and generally running around trying to get things together.
Thoughts have turned to the weather. We've known for the last three months that there would be very little flow on the river and it's been proved to be correct, but the other two big variables which would greatly effect our speed, namely temperature and wind speed have been harder to predict. The good news it that at the moment they seem fairly favourable. It seems that it's going to be considerably cooler than last week which is a huge relief to us. Cold, I can deal with. Just eat more pies and hot chocolate :-) The winds seem as though they will be fairly light which again will help our cause. The bottom line is we will just have to wait and see and deal with whatever nature decides to throw at us.
Anyway, I am out of the loop for the rest of the week so it's going to be Adam's job to sort out the last few bits and details before we travel down on Friday. We're feeling good about it and hopefully the hard work over the winter will pay off for us this year. To all crews taking part in this year's event, I wish you the best of luck and I hope that you achieve your goals and have an enjoyable race. I'll see you at St Thomas's for a bacon roll.
and if you want to give a silent cheer for boat 371, then that would be grand. See you on the other side.
Replies
Antony; I wouldn't let me anywhere near your boat if I were you. I have a tendency to break things. Have a great race and give us a wave when you go past. :-)
Due to reasons that I will not bore you with the last few days have been a mad rush to prep kit ready for the start of the DW and while I have been steadily ticking stuff off of the 'to do' list there is still a lot of stuff still left 'to be done'. I've been focussing on the mystere. It's not ours and we've been loaned it for free, which is great, but there's no doubt that it's seen better days. I spent the best part of two hours today installing a new rudder wire as the old one looked particularly brittle and was badly frayed. Having never done it before I was obviously quite concerned that I'd stuff it up. It is a little disconcerting when you take it apart and find out how rudimentry it all is, the rudder bar merely being a couple of sticks screwed together with the cable threaded through it to lock the wire in place. I took pictures as I went to ensure that I reassembled it in the right order. Not having an access hatch at the rear I had to use the old cable which was already in situ to pull the new cable through.
Not so much state of the art, more like state of the ark.
Belt and braces
I used an electrical connector block that you can get from diy stores as a locknut to keep both ends of the wire fastened as well as the standard screws. It's worth carrying a spare one of these in the boat with a small screwdriver in order to repair a wire breakage.
I spent quite of bit of time checking over the hull. I was originally going to apply some gel coat to a few areas but on closer inspection it didn't need it. I also had a play around with using joined cable ties to secure the drybag under Adam's footrest. I don't think it's worked too well so we may well revert back to bungees. If the boat is going to break, then it will be the footrest that goes. I might just see if I can get a piece of timber that we could use as a replacement if that were to happen.
The sunshine was lovely but I could clearly see the bottom of the river and debris on the surface was not moving at all. 100 miles of canal anyone?
With my gammy foot proving tiresome again I dashed to the Sweatshop in Teddington and bought some New Balance MT101 running shoes. Horrible colours but very slim fitting and supportive with good grip on the sole, they should do the job. I've basically got tomorrow to pack most of the gear and then next week Jonesey's going to sort the food and a few last remaining bits. Our last paddle together will be on Sunday night, owing to another 40th birthday, but as it's Adam's wife it's a fairly important one. Shepperton to Teddington which will be couple of hours and then nothing until Saturday 7th April. Just want it done now.
Anthony- Dancing like crazy, with very little effect. :-0
At the end of my last post I mentioned that Adam and I would be going out for a long paddle later that evening. We did and we had a really great one. Right up to the point where we capsized. We had bashed our way up to Molesey, portaged and then carried on for another 20 minutes or so. The conditions were decidedly sub optimal with the wind throwing us off but we felt relaxed and comfortable. We were not doing any intervals, instead just doing a DW paced effort. As we turned back the weather was getting more filthy but as we were heading for home we were not particularly bothered. We were no more than 10 minutes from home, approaching Ravens Ait when we went in. It was our first capsize in a year so we think we were due one. We were close to the bank so we didn't have far to swim but getting back into the boat was very difficult, with us both having to get in while standing waist high in water. We were very cold on the way back but thankfully not too far from the club and a hot shower.
Last night we continued the process of laying siege to 'the canoeists' Everest' over a curry and a few beers. Dad and John came over with Adam in order that we could plan our practise paddle in a couple of weeks over the Waterside D route. After speaking to Ed at the Royal a couple of week's ago we've decided to amend the paddle by not paddling from Devizes to Newbury, but instead we will be putting in at Pewsey and then finishing at Aldermaston. This does away with the long and frankly boring first 11 miles or so without a portage and means that we will also be paddling part of the later canal when things start to get a bit harder and there's a few navigation points to negotiate. We'll also have to deal with the Monkey Marsh portage which is causing a few problems at the moment and a few low bridges. It should make for a more useful paddle with more portaging while still giving us enough data to accurately know our canal pace. It will be very interesting to see how we compare to the race last year.
The devil is in the detail and hopefully we are getting the details right.
It's been the usual story with outside pressures meaning that training has had to be fitted in and around work and family commitments. Work's been mental (but enjoyable, I should hasten to add) while Mrs Wheezy has had a lot of stuff on also, meaning that it has not been as easy for me to head out the door and train. I am very lucky; without her I wouldn't stand a hope of doing half the shenanigans that I get up to in the name of sport and when she has stuff to do (because she has a life too) it rather puts into focus what I am able to do with her support. <3
My legs have also been feeling very achy from the 10km race last Sunday and all this stuff has led to a relatively quiet week. Something had to give and that something was my 2 turbo sessions. I valiantly plugged away at getting my runs done and once again I have the Marathon Talk's Jantastic Spring motivation challenge to thank for getting me out the door when all I wanted to do was sit on the sofa and eat crisps. Actually, that's a lie. I did sit on the sofa and eat crisps (while marking piles of books) but I then went out for my runs when Mrs Wheezy got home. So there I was running around the streets at 10.30 at night, eyelids barely open, running on stiff stumps for legs. I did the runs but I can't say that I enjoyed them.
I've had 2 paddles so far this week. The first was in the mystere with Adam on Monday night. A really good fun, 2 hr paddle with lots going on. The rowing club was out in force and the wash that the support boats threw up around Raven's Ait had us bouncing around but we were relaxed and once through it all we did 6 x 3 minutes with 2 minutes recovery, and then it was a slow DW paced effort for the rest of the paddle. Just after portaging Molesey we saw another DW crew training, heading the other way and exchanged greetings which was cool. We were meant to meet up again on Friday night but Adam couldn't make it so there I was heading out at 9pm on my own. For once, the ergo seemed tempting but by the time I got to the club I had regained my senses enough to get a laance out of the shed. I headed up to Kingston and did an interval session of 8 x 2 minutes hard with a 90 second recovery. I was working really hard and the laance took a bit of a battering as my technique began to disintegrate andI started smacking the deck of the boat with my paddles, so over the last 2 reps I slowed it down a touch and tried to get some semblance of technique back. After 50 minutes I plodded back to the club feeling like I'd had a pretty good workout.
As I look out the window now, cold rain's falling and we've got a long paddle scheduled for tonight, so we probably will not be off the water until gone 11pm. I suppose starting a training session tired, at night in the cold and dark is good DW acclimatisation, but then again, it'll probably be 30 degrees Celsius again this Easter.
Onwards.
Replies
Hodge; Thanks mate. Glad that your training seems to be going well. Still haven't decided about Snowdonia yet.
I was flicking through my old photos on the computer the other day and came across this one. It was taken at Teddington in the 2010 DW race and the funny thing is I remember very little about being there. I do remember the fact that I had spent the proceeding 30 minutes in tears, gently sobbing in the back of the boat sitting in a pool of my own wee, barely able to lift the paddle shaft above the cockpit. It was not a good place to be. As hard as that was and as low as I got it was still infinitely better to be there and ready to go into London than not there at all. For Adam and I, it is all about Teddington. Whether we catch the tide in the morning or have to wait until the afternoon then as long as we get there then we'll be ok.
Having to wait those few hours for the afternoon tide, should that be necessary, will however bring its own problems. Being members of the Royal which is only a stone's throw from Teddington Lock means that we've got a nice comfortable base in which we can refuel, change and get our heads down for a couple of hours in the warmth until we are let through onto the tidal section. If any members of the Royal are reading this and you see two people that look and smell like tramps lying down in the clubhouse on April 7th, then please do not be alarmed. It's just us. But then, after all our muscles and joints have nicely seized up, tendons have had time to get inflamed after the nurofen's worn off and blisters popped we'll have to get back in the boat and then paddle the tidal Thames in the middle of the afternoon on Easter Sunday, when every boat and everyone and their mother will be out on the river. We are reconciled to the very real possibility that we may have to do that but we'll be doing our best to ensure that we catch the morning tide, even if that means squeaking through at 8 o' clock. We've got to know the area around the lock very well, with us pounding up and down the Kingston straight and the fact that we are both former Teddington School schoolboys also makes this quite a home from home for us.
On Friday night we headed out from the Royal. We were both clattered after a long day at work so we decided to do a DW paced effort. We paddled down to the lock first which we now use as a short warm up to get settled before we turn back to head up to Hampton Court. As we made our way down to Teddington there was a small group of boats moored on the bank. In front of them was a small speedboat and as we got within 5 metres of it we saw that there was someone in it and they suddenly gunned the engines causing an enormous wash that broke over the front of the kayak sending water into my cockpit. it was obviously done completely on purpose with the intention of capsizing us. We rode it out fine but we were screaming our heads off at him, only to then see another 2 speedboats waiting on the bankside with another 2 morons in them. What kind of dick would think that it's fun to try to capsize a kayak in the dark? They were gunning around well above the speed limit for this section of the Thames without any lights visible!! Frickin' unbelievable.
We turned across the river and had a great paddle up to Hampton and back and as we got back to the clubhouse we saw one the boats right in the middle of the river. He saw us and started waving a light, not at us, which was the queue for the other 2 speedboats to come through at high speed causing another huge wave. Unfortunately this time we were beam on with a lot of reflection waves coming off of the hard bank from the sailing club next to the Royal, so we were really bounced around this time, but again we stayed upright pretty comfortably. I sincerely wish those 3 blokes a slow and lingering death. I am still wondering whether we should report it to the Police.
In other news......
I went with Mrs Wheezy to the Kingston Phoenix Annual Dinner and Awards evening last night and had a fab time. Had a few cheeky beers and got a couple of medals for some handicap places which was nice and I won a Phoenix mug in the raffle. Today I ran the Nonsuch Park 10k as one of Simon's relatives couldn't run it, so I had his number. As usual, I went out too fast and by halfway I was blowing hard, but I held on to take 4th place and just missed out on ducking under 40 minutes. Next time.......
You may have gathered that my last post was written in a bit of a sulk. I apologise. I'm over it now. It was written on the back of 2 rubbish paddles (the other one was me in a K1, just not on it at all) and a feeling that it's all getting too close and we haven't put in enough long miles. That last K2 paddle was meant to be all about miles in the bank and it wasn't and it seemed that in the course of a 2 hour paddle we had regressed 6 months.
But of course, we hadn't. After a few days we got back into the mystere. Originally we were going to K1 but we decided that we needed to do another K2 paddle so we headed out on Sunday night. The aim was to do a solid 90 minute paddle and include some good quality reps. After a warm up to Teddington lock we turned back and started doing our 4 minute reps but really trying to nail our technique. For me, it's all about the catch and setting up the stroke at the beginning as I seem to have developed a tendency to slap the water when tired so I've really been trying to get the paddle vertical and spear the water. I am better at this when I slow the stroke down so while the reps were about increasing our speed and aerobic workrate we were not going so fast as to become ragged. We were on our seventh rep when I felt what I thought was something hitting my BA and I saw someone running after us along the towpath. I assumed that it was someone throwing stones at us only for Ad to tell me that we'd snagged a fishing line. The fisherman wasn't particularly happy that we'd dragged his brand new, £120 carbon fibre rod into the water. Adam politely pointed out that we had 3 lights on the boat and he was practically invisible. Thankfully after a few minutes we were able to unhook us from his line and after a bit of gentle persuasion, his fishing rod appeared from the deep. No harm done. Anyway, 10 miles done with the best part of 28 minutes bouncing along at a tempo pace. If nothing else it was enjoyable. Last night we were back out again, this time in the laances doing more technique work. We were both clattered so after an hour we called it quits.
Right now, I would like to write this post with a lot of expletives. Working in the profession that I do writing something on the internet for everyone to read that involved a lot of fruity language would not do me any favours so therefore I will exert a large degree of self control and merely use this forum to whinge. What's the reason for this downturn in mood? Paddling, or #*@!$~g paddling as I currently call it.
Adam and I went out for a paddle this morning and to put it mildly, it was not good. I could tell within the first 10 seconds that Adam was not comfortable again and we had 40 odd minutes of the boat twitching, support strokes going down and the boat being absolutely rigid beneath us. I tried the good cop / bad cop routine, Adam 'had a talk with himself' and we finally got the boat running pretty well as we pulled up at the portage at Hampton Court. However by that time the effect of the preceding hour had taken its toll on me. Being a weedy runner I need to get my lower body engaged into the stroke but when things are so tense in the boat I have a tendency to revert back to 'all arms' paddling so as not to roll the boat any more than necessary. As we came back towards Kingston I wasn't a happy bunny; I was a bunny in the death throes of myxomatosis, thrashing in the water getting progressively more black in mood, wanting nothing more than to be out of the boat with my arms and shoulders aching more than I would expect. The situation was now reversed with Adam now calming me down and encouraging me to keep my form until we got back to the club.
It is very frustrating for us both as all we want to do is to get out on the water, put the miles in and do the race. Ad genuinely cannot get his head around what's happening and it is purely a mental problem, block, whatever you want to call it that stops him relaxing in the boat. The upshot is that we end up using a lot of energy in the process of merely staying upright in perfect conditions, like it was this morning. We have paddled in some truly foul weather this winter and paddled REALLY well in those conditions. It simply does not make sense and the uncertainty of what paddle we're going to have when we go out on the water is pretty draining on us both. I feel for Adam, I really do. Short of us employing the services of a sports psychologist, I cannot see what else he could do to resolve this, but it seems that at the moment we are just going to have to live with it, keep paddling and believe.
The upshot of all this is that it's got me thinking about the DW in the future and I've decided that this is going to be my last crack at it for a while and quite possibly for good. I am ultimately a triathlete, not a good one but significantly better than I am as a paddler, and at the moment I am not doing either of them particularly well. I am simply spreading myself too thin. So, we ARE going to finish this bloody race and then my Dad can have my paddles so he can do it next year. I'll be back on my bike.
A frozen BA; always a good sign of a DW training session.
We had a long K2 paddle scheduled for last Sunday but we only ended up doing one hour. We were going to meet early in the morning and head upstream from Teddington to Walton and back but neither of us were on it at all. I had been out in Chinatown until late so I was feeling pretty delicate, while Adam decided that he was no longer able to paddle the mystere. After having such a great paddle a few days before this one was in every way, the complete opposite despite the conditions being perfect. We splashed about along the Kingston straight, just about staying upright and then turned round and came home. We put it down to being out early and having not warmed up properly. I did remark that at some point in the DW we would be paddling pretty early and cold so we might need to sort that out. :-0
Anyway, we were out again on Wednesday night and the conditions were a lot more sketchy than they had been on Sunday with very gusty wind and a high wind chill so it didn't look good for a confidence inducing session. But we had a brilliant paddle. I am really working on getting my paddle as vertical in the water as possible and we are more often getting 'the bounce', a point when the boat seems to be pulsing through the water and we've got that simple harmonic motion with the boat rocking gently underneath us, instead of it being flat and lifeless. We don't achieve that state all the time but we are gradually getting there more and more often, which I am hoping is a sign that our technique work is starting to pay dividends.
Both Adam and I went out individually in K1's as well this week. I was out on Friday night and it was very cold. I spent an hour paddling the Kingston straight again, doing some technique work and drills and 4 x 2 minute hard efforts. I just tried to ensure that I was not dawdling at any point and had a solid paddle for an hour. I was the only person on the river and it was beautiful. :-)
Our DW plan has come together and we've got 2 support crews this time. We've got my Dad and my father-in-law John and then we've also got Phil and Alex D. Dad and John have a combined age of 138 and Phil and Alex are ginger. Success is assured!! it's going to be great having them help us as they are all top blokes and having more than one support means that no one crew has to go through the entire event supporting us.
We've pencilled in our long paddles although in the next 60 days we are probably going to be doing a lot more K1 work than last year as both Adam and I have family and friend commitments that will need to come first and actually means we cannot do any of the Waterside events. So we'll be doing Devizes to Newbury on our own and also Dreadnaught to Marlow and Marlow to Old Windsor will be our other longer paddles. We've purchase a Garmin etrex GPS so we'll accurately know our speed on the water but we'll use it in the race for accurate pacing to ensure that we stay on schedule. Having said that we've worked out our provisional start times and are confident in our plan and confident that we'll finish if our pace is not what we expect or if it drops.
Adam and I had a stonking paddle last night. Wednesday night has become a regular session with us meeting up with a few others training for the DW. We went out in the Mystere while Laurence and Rob joined us in Laances. We were meant to do 4 efforts between Kingston railway bridge and Teddington Lock but the weather was lousy with strong gusts making it hard to keep any kind of rhythm in our stroke, so we focused again on our technique and staying relaxed. In those kind of conditions in the past we've got really tense and struggled to focus on what we needed to do. It just feels completely different to how it was this time last year; despite the weather being pretty grotty we really enjoyed the paddle and had real confidence in ourselves and the boat. I don't think we worry about having to paddle all the time either. We're more ready to brace if required, ride out the bumps and then get going again when things have settled. We would not have won any speed prizes last night but I genuinely think it was one of our best paddles that we have ever done and with the two of us being creatures of confidence then that counts for an awful lot. We threw in a couple of portages as well, to try and remember what to do and we managed to not drop the boat so we must be doing something right.
We still have a lot to do however. Our support crew is still very much work in progress but we have a plan and hopefully by the time of the next post we'll have one lined up. It's only 72 days to go which realistically at best, leaves us with somewhere between 20 and 30 training paddles left. :-/
We had a bit of a boost as well, from the DW legend that is Brian Greenaway. Last year Adam and I set up a facebook page as we were paddling for charity. Anyway, we kept the page going, basically so that we could insult each other on a public forum and the other day Brian decided to LIKE our page. That is very cool.
In other news....
#Jantastic is coming to an end and thankfully so is my cough. I only have 2 more runs to do this week to keep my 100% record of 5 runs per week in January, so I have had to set my Febulous targets. I am maintaining my 5 runs but I now have to give a distance for a longest run each week, so I've gone 10,12,14 and 12 miles. Hopefully that will also help to remove the bit of extra weight that's started to form around my middle.
I have set a new record this week with 3 turbo sets. Well, 2 and a half. This evening's brick session was curtailed by a puncture (a puncture, indoors, on a turbo, sheesh....) Anyway, it's a start. The winter plan, after a 6 week delay, is finally underway.
Last week was very nearly a complete write-off; by Thursday evening my foot had swollen considerably and I could barely stand on it, let alone walk or run. But I hit the rehab as hard as I could and by the weekend I was able to do a couple of short runs on the Saturday (15 mins max) and then two more short ones on the Sunday. Being involved with the rest of the Tritalk team helped to get me out the door, which is precisely what the #Jantastic challenge is all about. Yesterday and today I increased the duration again and it seems that everything is back to normal, although I will wait until next week before starting some serious speedwork.
The focus is now firmly on our DW preparation and I am getting that excited feeling you get with an impending big event. We were due to do the Luzmore Race from Elmbridge to the Royal but with my foot playing silly beggars it seemed highly unlikely that we'd get on the start line. As it was, we could have ended up doing it but on Saturday night Adam and I paddled up to Hampton Court for the first time this year. A solid 8 mile paddle in the Laances, again focusing on technique. That was backed up with another short paddle on Monday night; a quick 45 minute paddle to Raven's Ait and back and on Friday night we will be finally paddling the Mystere down to the Royal from Walton. I think both of us are going to try to paddle more independently in order to get hopefully, three paddles in per week.
Unlike last year where we did quite a few tempo and interval sessions, I think it'll be better to focus much more on steady, DW paced paddles. I think that will help us to learn to paddle properly with the most efficient technique possible, rather than paddling like madmen with rubbish technique. Bob has offered to help us with a training schedule so we can discuss that with him and see what he has to say about that. Paddling fast(er) is more fun but it might not actually help us to get to Westminster.
We're hoping to do a few races in preparation, but I know that Adam is not as keen as I am to have another go, but I really do think that we should. It's just actually fitting it all in. We should be able to do either the Waterside B and/or C and the Runnymede to Royal race in March. Ad's not around for the Waterside D, so we are going to have to do that on our own. We are both keen to paddle the nighttime section again in training runs, i.e. Marsport to Shepperton and I think that is going to involve some very late night Friday paddles. We just can't see a way to fit them in at any other time at the moment. There is however one other big stumbling block; we found out a couple of weeks ago that we do not have any support as Phil will not be available. That's a pretty big headache that we have to resolve but I am sure that we can find someone who can throw the odd hot cross bun at us.
After a really good 6 weeks where we had been regularly getting on the water 3 to 4 times a week, our confidence was sky high, but it only took one so-so paddle on Sunday for us to start getting doubts in our minds about our ability. The problem was, was that we actually paddled damn well on Sunday but we just didn't realise it at the time. We were not fast, but it was a blustery evening with quite a bit of chop on the water and we were paddling late at night when we were pretty tired. I really tensed up again as we went through by Kingston Bridge where there are no easy get-outs if we take a swim and Adam's back started to play up again. All we could see was the negatives because it was not as good as it had been for quite a while. We had a couple of occasions where we had to put a support stroke down, for example when I didn't see an outlet pipe spewing out a jet of water until it was pushing the nose of the Mystere well off course; so of course we thought about the fact we'd put down some support strokes. What we failed to see, until yesterday was that actually, we needed to put those strokes down and we did it without fuss and carried on paddling. We stayed upright and never looked like we were going to roll. It was one of those paddles that without us realising at the time has probably helped to make us better paddlers; not faster, but better. We have also become so focussed on every paddle being great and achieving what we needed in 'The Plan' that we forgot to enjoy what we were doing, because that's why we should be doing this, right?
So last night we met up for another paddle. Again, it was very dark but generally conditions were much better, but we set out simply to paddle for an hour, stay relaxed and enjoy it. Within two minutes of pushing off we encountered 2 rowing eights and a support boat moving really fast the other way. :-( Okay, let's see how relaxed we can stay faced with this little lot. So as I turned in, took a deep breath and started saying 'footbar' to anyone who would listen, namely Ad who's a captive audience anyway, we were greeted with the two biggest waves that we have had to ride so far. I wasn't initially hopeful but we got through them ok with a support stroke or two and we then proceeded to Kingston Bridge with the water bumping us around badly and, even though I say so myself, we rode the bumps really well and never felt like we were going to roll at all. The rest of the paddle was great and we even paddled through the bridges on the way home with some semblence of confidence.
So Ad and I chatted and I felt that we should commit to starting the DW. Up until now we've always hedged our bets and alluded to the fact that we might not be good enough to start; a sort of relaxed 'let's just see how we go.' Well, I believe that we are good enough and it's important that we focus on our ultimate goal. Don't get me wrong; we still have a way to go yet but when I consider our last two paddles and how we've coped with the conditions then as long as we keep training consistently and effectively then there shuld be no reason why we shouldn't make the start in good shape.
Because of this rather non-commital attitude to the start of the DW we have also not really worried about sorting out our support crew, with us just wanting to focus on what we were doing in the boat. The support crew is obviously vital, as this excellent post describes and I really wanted to make sure that we have some experience in our crew to give us the best chance of finishing. Ad and I are really pleased that Alan S is going to support for us; a man who knows all things DW and probably singlehandely saved our race last year at Dreadnaught and I still have the cable-ties attached to my spraydeck that he put on so we could open and close them quicker . His experience and knowledge is a great thing for us to have; a bit like turning up at your local go-kart track to find that Ross Brawn has set up you car. We still need to sort out a second team and a few friends have kindly offered so we are going to have to start organising some training paddles with them.
Ad's away for a few days but next week is a bit of a biggie; paddle Tuesday, long paddle Wednesday and the Waterside A on Sunday. Our first big test before the DW. Exciting times.
A 1 hour 40 minute paddle from Teddington to Molesey and back. A pretty filthy night but it had to be done and pretty tough going at times, although completed without any major mishaps. We have come to the conclusion that we are not as good at paddling slowly and we find the longer paddles harder to complete successfully. Pretty stupid training for the DW then. Doh. We can only get one paddle in together next week so I am going to have to do a K1 session or two on my own.
It was going to be a fartlek session but as the temperature had dropped a lot again, we decided to do the 1 hour paddle as 2 x 30 minute efforts with us trying to really nail the portages. It was great. The canal was glassy smooth as the wind had all but gone and we were particularly pleased with how well we got back up to speed at the put ins.
Back on the river on Wednesday and a long paddle on Sunday evening. Everything's still going to plan, so I am obviously wondering when and how the wheels Will fall off.
Replies Hodge - Great. It's good to get advice from a coach as that'll really help. I think that good technique eradicates an awful lot of the potential reasons why competitors don't make it to the end of the DW
Last night was a 2 hour turbo which was pretty difficult but it was nice to do a 'long bike' and while staring at the back of my garage door is hardly the same as pedaling on the lava fields of Kona (never likely to do that anyway) it was great to try to push a big gear for a long time, and still made it in bed by 10. Result.
This morning was a long paddle which ended up being 2hrs 20 mins. The 2 really nice things about it was that it was very stress free; just a good, solid paddle on the Wey Navigation at DW effort, out and back with a few portages thrown in and Adam's core held up. Normally after 90 minutes we start twitching all over the place. Gee, who'd have thought core exercises would work? ;-) It was very blustery in places which slowed us a lot but we were able to practice in these tricky conditions in a relatively easy environment. The other thing we started experimenting with was food, mainly to get Adam used to eating during aerobic exercise. I just kept it simple, taking along some cheese and marmite sandwiches cut into small squares and some nuts and raisins. We'll introduce gels at a later date. I know which ones I like but they can take a lot of getting used to.
Replies Hodge - It's really worth spending the time getting your core fully engaged in the stroke. Like you, I tend to switch off and during a slower paddle revert back to arms only. That's where the tempo paddles we are doing where we have a 1 hour paddle that consists of 3 x 15 minutes with 5 mins rest really help because in a 1 hour paddle we are doing 45 minutes where we really focus on our technique. On each rep I'll focus on one thing e.g. rep 1, pressing fully against the footrest / rep 2, getting my lead shoulder forward / rep 3, hands high and fully extended. Gradually it begins to become more natural.
I spent quite of bit of time checking over the hull. I was originally going to apply some gel coat to a few areas but on closer inspection it didn't need it. I also had a play around with using joined cable ties to secure the drybag under Adam's footrest. I don't think it's worked too well so we may well revert back to bungees. If the boat is going to break, then it will be the footrest that goes. I might just see if I can get a piece of timber that we could use as a replacement if that were to happen.
The sunshine was lovely but I could clearly see the bottom of the river and debris on the surface was not moving at all. 100 miles of canal anyone?
At the end of my last post I mentioned that Adam and I would be going out for a long paddle later that evening. We did and we had a really great one. Right up to the point where we capsized. We had bashed our way up to Molesey, portaged and then carried on for another 20 minutes or so. The conditions were decidedly sub optimal with the wind throwing us off but we felt relaxed and comfortable. We were not doing any intervals, instead just doing a DW paced effort. As we turned back the weather was getting more filthy but as we were heading for home we were not particularly bothered. We were no more than 10 minutes from home, approaching Ravens Ait when we went in. It was our first capsize in a year so we think we were due one. We were close to the bank so we didn't have far to swim but getting back into the boat was very difficult, with us both having to get in while standing waist high in water. We were very cold on the way back but thankfully not too far from the club and a hot shower. 
