Personal Journal

New Fears and Kayaking

First, and most importantly...

I got my roll today. I got myself upright on my own, in still water (as opposed to fast-moving water out on the river proper, which they call a "combat roll"). Many times. I GOT IT!

On the 9th day, not coincidentally on the day I set aside to celebrate Jean, I got my roll.

And it felt easy.
I didn't get it every time. I still sometimes lift my head up too soon, or I let my padle sink too deep. But I got probably 4 out of 5 today each time we practiced.

The river?
Another story.
Four bail-outs and swims.

But that doesn't bother me so much. Because I'm still seeing progress.

What bothers me is the way fears rise up into me. It's just surprising. And it does take away some of my ability to control myself, which is just completely unhelpful.

Today on my private lesson I was taken to the "playpark" in Golden Colorado (home of Coors beer, we were just upriver from the brewery). It's fed out of a reservoir in the high country, and this time of year, it's running pretty fast (from my point of view at least). And it's narrow, so it LOOKS like it's moving really fast. A lot faster than the river I've run twice, which is a Sunday drive by comparison, or so I would argue (mostly because it's wider).

And as soon as I walked my boat up to the launch point, I felt the fear rise up in me. I tell myself going into these things that it's to be expected, I just have to deal with it.

Well, when I sat into my boat and we did our first peel-out, I noticed how much stronger that eddy flows. It just grabbed me and had its way with me in the sense that my desire to maintain position was gone. I didn't flip (there) but it did send the signal to my fears that we were right to be afraid (which isn't the truth).

And I got this surge of adrenaline - I couldn't control it. I knew I wanted to stay relaxed and stay in the river, but my heart and my muscles were doing "fight or flight" and as a result, just sitting there in the boat, I lost my relaxed stance, even though I wanted to find it, and worse, I lost a LOT of energy.

I'm not terribly upset by it - I'm not being hard on myself about it. I can't just tell my brain to turn off my adrenaline rush. But it certainly was counterproductive.

We ran the stretch of the river twice, and I had to bail twice each time, at various spots. I got some good practice swimming, seriously, remembering the position to float in, hanging on to my boat (paddle is another damn story), and listening to my instructor's directions on what to do. I didn't panic in the flow, and for my experience, that water was moving fast. we really had to work together to get over to the side (I hang on to the handle on the back of the instructor's boat, and to the handle on the front of mine, which has about 20 extra pounds of water in it.

Poor fucking ERic (I didn't get Maya - she took a job in Japan). After he got me to shore he had to go fishing for my paddle. The first time, he had to go all the way down by Coors brewery and then walk his boat back up. The second time, we couldn't see it, and weren't sure it had gone downstream yet, but he went down to look, and I walked up to where I flipped. Sure enough it was there for me to grab, so Eric paddled down god knows how far and then gave up and walked his boat back again. I tipped him well because of all the walking I made him do.

Two of my bail-outs weren't necessary. If I just could have stayed calmer, longer, I could have had the T-rescue. But this was faster water, for one, which was a new scenario, and it was colder. This water is fed from a higher elevation reservoir, so the water is considerably colder. Probably in the 50s, but compared to the Platte river run, the Platte is like a hot tub, at least the first time you get wet.

So my day to celebrate Jean went really well. Maybe I wasn't the uber-kayaker that I had hoped I would be, and in fact I was somewhat disappointed that I bailed when I could have waited for the rescue (though one time I just had to bail - he was just too far away from me), I recognize that this is something you train yourself to rise above over many sessions.

There will always be new rivers that bring new fears.

What bothered me, and the thing I want to work on, is not getting so scared that I get an adrenaline rush. Because that was counterproductive in a big way.

But hey.
I got my first fucking roll today.
And that's ALL I want to concentrate on right now - how success feels.

Woot!