Surfski Knowledge Base

Reivers Dustin
05/15/11 #10663

Well that was the result: tired arms. Totally unofficial heared by someone results:

Singles: Ian M. Gabe N. Don K. David J.
Doubles: Debbie & Morris, <somebody>, Larry & Marc, Shawn & Reivers, Paul & Elena, <thundering herd of doubles>

I'm pretty flakey on this listing of doubles due to I couldn't see any further than the back of Shawn's neck as we neared the finish.

Nasty start for a lot of folks. The shoreline turn to the right with docks and favored inside line made for some wipeouts, swapped gel-coat and paddle jousting. Such a large field of double skis made for massive wakes if you were in the second tier. It turned into pack racing pretty soon after the right turn along shore. Shawn and i had trouble playing nice with Ben and son Eric - we kept running into their stern. We would catch a wave & they would climb one and unlike singles, the boat has a lot of inertia. Apologies to Ben and Eric, we know it messed up your pace. Ben picked a brilliant line out to the first major turn and we kept the lead pack of doubles in reach. There was a nasty rip in the way or we might have climbed over them. But I noticed Morris & Debbie had made a huge move really early and gapped the field. Further up ahead there was a snarling wolf-pack of singles. It seems Gabe was pulling. Ian mentioned that he found himself taking the ride since Gabe was “grinding away at it”.

For Shawn and i we were wondering how we would reel in our competition ahead as we made that big -almost 180 degree- turn. We had climbed up next to Ben/Eric, but there were some boat wakes messing everyone up. Everyone was chasing rides, but not many really hooked up. Larry and Marc decided to just give up the race and frolic where the waves went. It worked, they gaped the pack but were off line. Somehow Shawn found us a phenominal ride. It only worked for our boat and we climbed over everyone else in the pack. Unreal. It was like some oxygen-induced fantasy. As we got to the next mark we were in a hard run against Larry/Marc and they pulled the turn first. So then our plan was to rest up and sprint hard at the end.

Well. It really wasn't restfull hanging onto those two. Shawn kept asking me when we should do our sprint. I kept saying “later”. Finally, running on fumes, we just tried to scare 'em a little bit. We just could not climb over that stern wave. Hilde took a really embarrassing shot of the four of us hammering for the finish - old guys with bulging forehead veins, blowing mucus with fierce looking grimaces.

Was it fun? It was outrageous. I have no idea how such gritty effort could be so cool. It was the whole package: great duels, strange events on the water, outrageous luck, brilliant tactics, beautiful venue and truly worthy competition. Man I am so lucky to be in this thing. Oh, and lots of Molson and burgers and stuff.

We did it the Canada way this time. Go Canuks.

rd

Reivers Dustin
05/17/11 #10684

hehe, there's evidence of major oxygen debt looking at the results right around Warren B. You can see Jeff Hedge, Roger L. and some others right within seconds of each other.

Big pack of SUP's in the short course. Great event Bob.

I just dig foreign travels, don't you?

rd

Jeff Hegedus <jhegedus@…>
05/18/11 #10687

Kudos to Roger, who had the best race of his career! Just past the halfway point, Roger made his move on the pack, all focused and serious, and left the double ski a bunch os us were all globbed on. Knowing we would suffer badly, I joined him. We chased Warren down from afar the whole race, catching him right at the end. No drafting, diced for a quarter mile, and Warren took it by a nose. Nice job Roger!