SUPShed Spring Series Race 2 … bring on Race 3
September 06, 2017
So Sunday’s Orewa Surf Race was a mixed bag for me and that’s the way most stand up paddle races go. Some good stuff, some opportunities grabbed, some opportunities missed, some good decisions, some not so good.
A warm up on the water flagged that conditions were going to be quite challenging. Around 20knots of wind blowing from the south (cross-shore), a 0.6m swell coming into the beach from the east and the wind generating chop at an angle to the main swell. So a bit messy. The course involved in and outs through the surf, upwind and downwind legs in a kind of extended L-shape/triangle.
There were two of us girls in the 6km race and we started alongside each other. This is who I’m racing against and need to try and stay in touch with. Good paddlers can also be relied on to get off the line cleanly. With no other girls around, a guy started on my other side and he ended up side by side with my board. That was a pain. He was on the side I needed to paddle on to stay on line for the first buoy. In hindsight, starting on the other side of who I’m racing with would have been a better idea. Always learning!
Until bumping boards with my friend on the left, I was quite pleased with my running water start. Got the board over a breaking wave before getting it on the water. You want to get as much momentum as possible with starts and waves slow your progress when you’ve not built much speed. I’m working on my starts. They’re super important because once you’ve lost contact with the people you are racing with, especially the faster ones, you almost never get that distance back. That’s what happened on Sunday. I had to take longer routes around other paddlers. All distance lost.
So out through the surf break. Nice to be able to do this now without having an ‘oh no’ moment every time a wave, especially a breaking wave, comes towards me. My natural anxiety about the surf break used to make me tense up. With that comes less ability to absorb the board’s movement up and over a wave. There’s nothing like practice so your body works out what to do and can do it on autopilot.
Round the first buoy and into the tough upwind leg. At this point I was thinking that 3km would be a much more pleasant option. To be fair I was thinking that at the pre-race briefing. But sometimes what you know will be good for you and what’s going to be pleasant are two different things. I need experience in surf races so a few big, quick strokes to get on someone’s tail and on we go.
The second buoy took a while to arrive – headwind. Going past the buoy before starting to turn is a good idea into a headwind. I’ve learned the hard way that you want to allow a bit of space so the wind doesn’t blow you back into those big, shiny Starboard buoys. The downwind leg is fast and the waves were lining up pretty well with the next buoy. So when I got on the bumps, I kept paddling to catch the ones in front.
The beach buoy is a bit tougher and meant cutting across the wind generated waves and keeping an eye on the swell to stay lined up with the buoy. By this time I had a stabbing pain in both glute muscles every time my paddle was loaded. So that beach buoy turn wasn’t the most pleasant I’ve ever experienced (or the fastest).
The course was 6 of these 1km ‘triangles’ so I won’t trouble you all with the grind of the next 5 laps. Why keep going you might well ask when those inner voices are saying ‘ouch’ and ‘3km would be plenty’? A healthy bit of internal debate that went something like this … I knew 6km was doable, just a bit unpleasant at times; I’d be missing out on experience that can only be got racing in these conditions; if I don’t do this, I’ll have to do some other exercise today; I’ll feel crap about myself when I know I can but don’t. So then … focus my mind on something else … the water, getting my paddle cleanly in the water, Victoria out on the water encouraging everyone along.
A wise manager of mine once got me to capture what went well and where there’s room for improvement in challenging situations. Otherwise your mind focuses on what didn’t go well. That’s a habit I do with races. So, on the positive side of the ledger: an OK start; going well with my bottom hand lower down my paddle; aerobically this is getting way easier; I can pick up my stroke rate quite comfortably (thanks Victoria for that encouragement). On the ‘work-ons’ side of the ledger: can still improve starts and I need to; figure out what’s causing that glute pain; practice ‘surfing’ my raceboard more.
Nice massage on Monday 🙂
To find out more about the Orewa Spring Series brought to you by SUPSHED and Starboard, visit https://www.supshed.com/pages/event-orewa-spring-series
Victoria offers a non-competitive option for paddlers new to racing called “First Stroke”. It’s only $20 to signup and you get an intro to race specific skills, and a fun paddle for about 40min (all equipment provided) as well as the option to enter the “Social Splash” 1km race afterwards.
For those of you already paddling, there are 1km, 3km and 6km Race options. Next event is Sunday 24 September. Hope to see you there!
