The PSK Hub – Performance Sea Paddling Stuff
Wings The often discussed question in the sea kayaking world is whether a wing paddle improves performance. In a competition environment, there is no doubt that a wing paddle gives a performance advantage for the forward stroke over a flat paddle, and hence it is established in sprint, marathon, ocean ski racing and wild water …
The Boss and myself have an early start to make the tide for a play session in the Swellies. This time we are joined by Roger Chandler of Coastal Spirit. We start with a play on ‘Boily Wave’ for a wake-up and then move on to ‘Snowdonia Rapid’ which is running quite nicely. Then as …
Continue reading “Video – Early Doors – Surfing The Swellies”
by John Willacy Here we are having a little fun in the sun, using the friendly wind over tide conditions on the Menai Strait in Menai Bridge, UK. We are trying not to get ‘owned’ – that is when a boat glides smoothly by, leaving you in its wake… The day brought neap tides, but …
Continue reading “Video – Owned – Menai Strait Wind Over Tide”
by Mike Conroy Background A couple of weeks earlier I had clocked up a 100km paddle on the Tamar Estuary, amounting to 13.5 hours in the saddle. Afterwards I was a bit achy but I felt that I could have done more. Later I messaged John Willacy and mentioned I was going to the Anglesey …
The Bay Morecambe Bay is a large bay in the north-west of England, it separates the counties of Cumbria and Lancashire and drains a number of rivers. It dries extensively to form large expanses of sand and mud. These sandflats are notorious for soft mud and quicksand and in many places the incoming tides move …
Continue reading “Morecambe Bay Crossing – The AA Route Planner Race”
by John Willacy Penrhyn Mawr is a tide race on the W coast of the Isle of Anglesey*, UK. The flooding tide, a rocky headland and a number of shallow reefs work together to form the often impressive tide race. It is a popular moving-water paddling spot in the UK sea kayaking scene. Here I …
If you like to keep your deck free of clutter, here’s a simple Taran tip for a lightweight paddle park to prevent wandering blades in those breezy admin moments. Wrap a few turns of insulation tape to a diameter ~14 mm. Then loop the elastic over your blade shaft and by stretching one side, slide …
by John Willacy Relaxing on the Cardinal Wave, post-training with The Boss. After a sess around The Arches, on the Menai Suspension Bridge, we dropped down for a warm-down surf on The Cardinal. The Cardinal Post creates a strong v-wave on the ebb, with a second wave perpendicular to the flow sitting behind. The V-wave …
Day 2 – Llandudno to Llanfairfechan – 17 km Today was to be a shorter day and so afforded us more of a luxury to look around. The aim was to arrive at the county boundary line at around high-water slack and then reverse direction to tootle back to the get out at Llanfairfechan. As …
Continue reading “The Coastal Counties Challenge – Conwy – Day 2”
For the Easter weekend we returned out attention to the Coastal Counties Challenge. Part of the aim of the challenge is to stretch paddler’s outlook (including our own) to sections of coastline that don’t always get so much attention. And so it was with this trip – Rhyl to Llanfairfechan. At first look it seems …
Continue reading “The Coastal Counties Challenge – Conwy – Day 1”