Category: Activities

Round the Mountain 2017

There are three salient facts about the Round the Mountain (RTM) race:

  1. For me, and for most racers in this area, this is our first race of the year.
  2. Much of the race occurs on a stream and a connected series of lakes that have a marked channel for the power boaters but there is no rule that says canoes and kayaks have to stick to the channel. In high water years, there are numerous shortcuts and “sneaks” if you’re willing to risk possible damage to your boat.
  3. It has a portage that can make or break your race.

Because this is a high water year, I preloaded my track from the 2015 race as a course in my GPS, because that was a high water year as well and I took all the sneaks. On Friday, Jim and I paddled the part of the course with most of these sneaks and tried to take mental note of the location of the hidden rocks and stumps. My GPS helpfully would buzz and say “off course” whenever I left the line I took in 2015 which was a real help. It was also telling me how many kilometers left to go, which I thought would be a great help for pacing during the race. Jim was saying out loud what he was memorizing as the landmarks for various distances from the finish, which turned out to be an even better help on race day.

So race day comes, and like always at RTM, it was overcast, cool verging on cold, and threatening rain. So pre-race preparation was mostly trying to find a mix of clothing that would be warm enough once you got up to speed, but you wouldn’t freeze to death waiting at the start line or if it started to rain. After careful deliberation, I ended up dressed exactly the same as the last two years – Viakobi v-cold pant and long sleeve top. Funny how that worked out. 

One feature of RTMs past is that the lake would be flat calm when you arrived, and about 10 minutes before the start it would suddenly whip up into 1-2 foot waves coming from your right bow quarter. That didn’t happen this year – it remained pretty flat all the way across the lake. The only waves were coming from a couple of boats with camera crews who were filming the race who were constantly hitting us with boat wakes at odd times and from odd angles. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Another feature of pre-race preparation is trying to determine who your competition was going to be. Roger Gocking wasn’t going to be there, but Eric, the guy Roger and I chased for much of last year’s Long Lake race (unsuccessfully) would. Pete was there of course, but last year I got ahead of him on the first lake and managed to put a gap on him after the portage, so I was pretty sure if I was at my best I could do that again. And there was this new guy in the same boat as me, a V10 Sport Ultra, named Royal. I don’t know much about Royal except he’s young and athletic looking, and I believe he was Matt Skeels V10 Double partner at Long Lake last year. I didn’t hold out much hope of beating him, but maybe his inexperience would give me a chance.

So they announced the start waves, and the second wave would be just unlimited kayaks and C-4s. That means I wouldn’t get my rematch against Eric because he’s in an Epic 18x and would be starting in the first wave. Also, it meant no C-2s to ride wake on. Oh well, maybe some of the C-4s would be the right speed.

The start siren went off and immediately Jim and a K-2 leapt ahead. Jim was actually dogging it a bit – he hadn’t done a proper warm up and so without a Matt Skeels or Todd Furstoss to push him, I think he was planning to warm up on course. He also seemed to stop and look back a few times, like maybe he was considering waiting for us and giving us a wake to ride. Pete is a fast starter and was soon ahead of all the second wave except for Jim and the K-2. Royal was on his wake, and I was three boat lengths back trying to get past the disappointingly slow C-4s. 

I’d have to review the video (oh, by the way, my cameras both worked all the way to the end this time!) but it took me maybe a kilometer to catch back up to the Pete and Royal train. We must have looked fancy with our 3 V10 Sports battling for position and for each other’s wakes. In a repeat of last year, just as we were catching up with some of the dense traffic of the first wave, I make my move and pull ahead of Pete and Royal. After that, I’m aware that at least one of them remained on my stern, but I couldn’t tell you if it was both – I don’t pick up a lot of detail in a quick glance back.

Soon after we headed into the river, I was passing a touring kayak from the first wave when he said: “there’s a rock right in front of you”. Stupid me, I’d been facing him instead of watching where I was going to get a good view for the video camera on my head. When I looked there was a rock sticking an inch out of the water less than a boat length in from in me. Without that guy’s warning, I probably would have hit it dead on and at high speed, wrecking my boat. So thanks, anonymous dude.

A bit later, we get to the most famous “sneak”. This is one Jim and I had scouted yesterday. It’s an island, and the prudent thing is to go around it. If you choose to go in between the island and the shore, there is a massive rock in the middle. The moderate path is to go to the right between the rock and the island, but if you go between the rock and the shore you save a few meters. I’d scouted it, so I knew there was a small rock lurking just at water level, and yesterday Jim had said he was going to take the moderate path and I’d said if I can see the rock before I get there so there are no waves or rain making it invisible, I’d take the risky path. I heard Royal behind me saying something about going right but I could see the rock, so I went straight. Honestly, I thought he was talking to Pete because I had scouted it and I sort of knew what I was doing. But in retrospect, he didn’t know that.

That was shortly before the bridge. Crossing under the bridge, I could see the “BayCreek cheering section” with Susan and Tracey and Kim, but without Vicki, it just didn’t have the volume I’m used to. Still, it was nice to see them there.

After the bridge, it gets into a twisty part where the channel was twisting all over the place but there were lots of opportunities to cut corners. I finally realized that while Royal was right on my tail, I couldn’t see where Pete was. Again, I only take very quick glances and so I didn’t know if he was 2 boat lengths back or 50. On some of my riskier shortcuts, Royal would take the conservative route and then come right back on my tail. At one point he said something about he’d get off my stern wake if I didn’t want him there, but I can hardly object to what is a perfectly legitimate racing tactic. What I probably should have done is grabbed a drink and let him lead for a while, but I wasn’t sure if the only reason I was still in contact with him was the shortcuts I was taking.

It was also during this stretch that I realized that the screen on my GPS was frozen up. This happened to me once before, on a bike ride, and I know from that experience that the only way to clear it is to hold the power button for 60 seconds, so I knew I wasn’t going to get it back for the rest of the race. As well as not getting heart rate and distance to go information, I was more worried that this was going to screw up my video overlay when I make my video. Damn. But oddly, it was still making the occasional beep, but I couldn’t tell if that was a kilometer lap indication or an “off course” indication.

During the twisty part, I hit a stump a glancing blow with my boat on a shortcut that I’d scouted yesterday. That made me a bit cautious and maybe half a kilometer before the portage I stayed in the channel past a couple of marker buoys where Royal went inside and he took the lead. I grabbed onto his stern wake, determined not to let go.

He slowed down before the portage and slowly slid in. I’d been practicing portages with Jim, whose preferred tactic is to come in full speed and jam on the brakes at the last possible second, but there was no room to go around Royal and no point doing so. He was a bit faster than me up the hill, even though he appeared to just be strolling up it. He caught the k-2 that was at the top of the hill with their boat on the ground. Just as he was even with them, they picked up the boat. Initially I’d thought they were going to let Royal go ahead of them and then get in my way, but instead, they were interfering with Royal and trying to go side by side with him on a trail that wasn’t wide enough for two boats. But then they dropped their boat again in the downslope, letting Royal get to the water ahead of them. I got to the dock as Royal was pulling away, and that was the last time I was in contact with him.

The k-2 was too fast, and I couldn’t get on their wake. About the only remaining bit of drama came at another “sneak” that I’d scouted with Jim yesterday. Royal wasn’t taking it, but the k-2 was. I knew the sneak was shallow, required a tight turn and there were numerous rocks on the far side of it. I had little confidence that the k-2 could get through without screwing it up somehow because they’re deeper draft and less able to turn than me. But I figured the best case scenario would be that they would be held up just long enough for me to catch them, and then I could ride their wake for a while and maybe catch Royal. Worst case they’d be bottomed out in the middle and hold me up, but again, afterward I’d have a wake to ride. No such luck, they went through without visibly slowing down, and I actually hit a rock with my rudder. So no k-2 wake for me, and Royal was visibly pulling away even without the benefit of my shortcuts.

From then it was just a matter of trying to pace myself based on my memories of the landmarks Jim had pointed out yesterday and trying to keep myself just on the verge of a stitch in my side. I’m so used to using my heart rate on my GPS to pace that this was literally painful.

It seemed to work, I set a personal record on the course. I really wish I had a GPS track to compare against previous years. I know in 2016 I didn’t use the sneaks because the water was low, and I know in 2015 I had a pretty terrible portage. But it would be nice to see these things side by side.

I talked to Eric afterward and he’d had a very similar time to mine, maybe 20 seconds or so faster, but he’d managed to ride some C-2 wakes for part of it. It would have been a great battle if we’d been in the same wave.

Oh well, time to drive home and then work on my race video.

Possible breakthrough on the camera front

I went for a paddle today with my GoPro Hero 5 Black, and in spite of carefully attaching my Novabeam USB battery, I only got 95 minutes from it, just as if I hadn’t used the battery. Meanwhile, I had the GoPro Hero 5 Session at home doing an experiment where I’d hooked up another Novabeam USB battery, and when I came home I discovered it had recorded 4 hours and only stopped because it had filled up the SD card.

But then I tried just unplugging and re-plugging the Novabeam on the Hero 5 Black, and it happily started recording. I suddenly realized that a light comes on in the Novabeam when you first plug it in. And it struck me that one significant difference between my “bench tests” on my desk and my tests on the water is that in both cases I plug the USB battery in and arrange the silicon putty here at my desk in both cases, but in the “bench test” I hit the Record button almost immediately, while for the water tests I first drive 20 minutes. I bet the battery is turning itself off in that time.

So next time I go paddling I’m going to have to try plugging the battery in and waterproofing it just before I hit record. If I can get 4+ hours of the battery, I can do that early in the pre-paddle preparation and still get the whole paddle or race. I’m so happy that I have probably figured this out before my first race.

More technique work.

Did some more work on technique. I took my front camera, my Motionize setup, and an idea of trying some different paddle lengths. So first off, I started off at my normal 214cm but with a tiny bit of pause to drive the paddle in before I start pulling and a mental emphasis on the catch. That actually seemed to help a lot. Then I tried some different paddle lengths. I have to say that I discovered some things:

  • The mental change made a lot more difference than the paddle length
  • Even though I changed the paddle length in Motionize before each test, the “Paddle depth” indicator on Motionize was useless. I’d increase my paddle length by a centimeter, and it would tell me that my paddle depth had decreased by 16 centimeters. So much for using it to test my catch.

Technique work

I’ve had two people point out this week that I’m *still* not getting my paddle blade fully in the water. I’ve been working on this for years now, and it just doesn’t seem to be getting any better. I’ve tried lengthening my paddle, shortening it, doing drills and just trying to be aware of the problem. I’m getting worried about it.

Another problem was pointed out in this Saturday’s video: I’ve got an asymmetry in the way my top hands come across my face. Compare:

Time to break out Motionize and find some quiet water to concentrate on my technique, I think.

I’m baffled by action cameras

One of the things that really bugs me about actions cameras is that almost every single one of them has about a 80 to 90 minute battery life. The sole exception I’ve found is the Contour Roam 3 which has nearly a 3 hour battery life. Unfortunately it’s limited to 1080p/30fps, and even at that I didn’t think the picture was as bright and vibrant as, say, my old Polaroid XS100.

After multiple camera failures mostly due to water, I decided this year to treat myself to a GoPro Hero 5 Black and a GoPro Hero 5 Session. They are both intrinsically waterproof and have good picture quality as well as higher resolutions like 4K/30fps and 1080p/60fps. But again, they’ve got that 80-90 minute battery life.

I did “bench tests” on my desk using external USB batteries and discovered that with an external battery, I could easily get 3 hours out of either camera. So using some zip-ties and silicon putty, I arranged these external batteries and waterproofed the cable connections and yesterday I went out to use them on the water. It was coolish and overcast, so overheating would not be a problem – it was certainly cooler than when I’d been testing at my desk, anyway. But I was extremely disappointed when the Session only gave me 88 minutes of video, almost as if I hadn’t had the external battery at all, and the Black gave me 115 minutes of video.

I’m trying to figure out why both cameras stop getting charge from the batteries out in the field, but work fine at my desk. Working hypotheses:

  1. The cameras are overheating and shutting down
  2. Recording a moving scene in the real world is more taxing on the cameras than recording a mostly static scene in my office, and so they’re trying to suck more power than the battery can provide
  3. The image stabilization is sucking down lots of power in the moving environment that it’s not on my desk
  4. The cables aren’t as secure as I think they are and they’re coming lose somehow

I consider the first one unlikely, because the field test was done in cool and overcast weather. When I got home, I tried both cameras again and they both started recording and lasted for the remaining time on the external batteries. To see if it was just the lack of motion in the office scene, I pointed both cameras at my computer screen and started a continuous play list of YouTube videos, and that didn’t seem to make any difference. That would tend to argue against the second hypothesis. I also discovered that I’d only had image stabilization turned on in the Session and not the Black, which argues against the third hypothesis. I can’t find any signs of looseness in the cable connections. Oh, and one other thing I discovered while doing my bench test – the front of the Session, especially the screws holding on the front lens cover glass, were almost uncomfortably hot to the touch. I should see if they get that hot on the water.

I have one other test I can try – I have a much bigger battery that has a 2.1A port for iPads. I don’t know if GoPros do the magic handshake that allows them to take higher amperage from 2.1A ports, but that would be a good test to see if they’re just using too much juice in the field. But this battery is way heavier, and also is going to be a bitch to waterproof, so I don’t think it’s a race-ready solution.

But one of the possibilities I didn’t include in the above list is that the target market for action cams are people who stop and start their cameras to capture short bursts of activities like sky dives and downhill ski runs, so nobody is actually designing or testing their cameras to see if they’re capable of doing multiple hour long videos.

One of the reasons I went for GoPro rather than some other brand is that the third party add-on infrastructure is there for GoPro in a way that isn’t there for Sony or Contour or other brands. Some of the older GoPro models had third party battery extenders, and I have hope that somebody else will eventually solve my problem for me. I asked Ray Maker (of DC Rainmaker) and he agrees with me that third party solutions may be imminent.