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Today was the race I thought about all the time I was rehabilitating my shoulder and losing weight. This was the real test if I was back or not. Ten miles, in the Adirondacks, with all the uncertainty of weather that might entail.
Yesterday, the forecast for today kind of sucked. Winds of up to 20 miles per hour, 80% probability of precipitation, and thunderstorm in the early afternoon. But this morning the forecast was quite improved – the rain was supposed to hold off until afternoon, and the wind was supposed to be lower. Well, one out of two aren’t bad – as start time approached it was clear that the skies were going to stay clear, but the wind was moderately strong whipping straight down the lake, with stronger gusts and building.
At the start, I lined up next to Roger Gocking with the idea of maybe trying to hold his wake – he’s always been faster than me, but I thought maybe with my improvements, I could hold him. But almost as soon as the start gun went off, Roger was fouled by some idiot in a guide boat. The guide boat guy put his oar right over Roger’s boat, and both of them had to stop dead. Honestly, guys, you know those things are slower than kayaks, and you’re not facing forwards, so you’ve got no right to be trying to mix it up with the kayaks on the front line. Line up behind us and wait your freaking turn. Roger is a better man than I am and didn’t yell at the guy, just proceeded to quietly untangle, but I needed a new strategy.
I latched onto Mike Littlejohn’s stern wake. He was going gang-busters. Jim M was ahead of us, as expected, and Todd F was coming up past us, but otherwise it was just us up front. Now in the past I’ve beaten Mike a few times, and he’s beaten me a few times. I don’t know what the difference is, except I know that he’s got two boats that he made himself and I can’t tell the difference between them, and one is unlimited class and one is touring class – and today he was in his unlimited class boat. But he’s also a big guy and his technique sucks, so I had an idea that maybe I could ride his wake on the way down, and then gap him at the turn, and extend my lead on the way back. Certainly that’s pretty much how it worked in 2010 – I increased my lead on everybody except Dave Wiltie into the wind on the way back, but I’d been on Wiltie’s stern wake then, and at this point there was nobody I could see likely to come through and drag me away from Mike.
My heart rate was really high – in the mid 160s. I didn’t think I could sustain that. By the 4 km mark, I was feeling it, and I wasn’t seeing any sign of weakness from Mike. The idea that he would fade and I’d be able to take the lead was kind of seaming like a pipe dream. And worse, the wind was coming hard from the right side, and my boat wanted to weathervane into the wind. I was wasting effort applying hard left rudder just to stay pointing straight ahead. I had a momentary bobble, and caught a glimpse over my shoulder and realized that Roger was caught up to us and riding my wake. That spurred me on a bit, and I tried to pass Mike. I was a little upwind, partly by choice, partly because my boat was weathervaning into the wind. Roger stayed on my wake, but I never managed to get more than half a boat length ahead of Mike. Even getting a better angle on the waves towards the turn bouy didn’t help.
But as I was cutting towards the turn bouy, I got a massive stroke of good luck – the war canoe “Dog Breath” came roaring by. At first, they clashed paddles with me and I said “Thanks, I really needed that” and one of them said sorry. But then I managed to get on their side wake. It was great – I had to sweep on the side towards them because I was getting sucked into them, but the speed was incredible. I put some serious distance into Roger and Mike. I yelled to the guys on Dog Breath “All is forgiven”. But we were close to the turn bouy and when they turned I couldn’t stay with them – I might have been able to if I was inside the turn, but I was on the outside. After the turn I tried to get onto one of their stern wakes, but it just wasn’t happening. And the wind was horrible – it was coming from the front, then from the side, then from the front. A couple of kilometers after the turn, there was an island and I was trying to get into the wind shadow of it as had Jim and Todd and the war canoe, but the weathervaning of my boat was making it really hard.
I eventually did it get into the wind shadow, but by the time I did, Mike and Roger were back on my tail, and soon afterwards Mike came up even with me, with Roger still on his tail. I still had the feeling I might be able to get past them in the end. The wind was now in our face, and it was strong. Some of the gusts were as strong as any I’ve ever encountered in the boat, and I had to switch to a low paddling style. But it was hard hard hard. Now it was all three of us side by side. I tried Mike’s side wake, I tried Roger’s side wake, I tried to get into the V between then, but nothing helped. Neither of them were showing any signs of fading, but I was. I was side by side with them with a kilometer to go, but in that last kilometer I fell off behind. By the end, Roger had a boat length on Mike, and Mike had a boat length on me.
It wasn’t as good as I’d hoped, but it was probably the best result I’ve had. I’ve never finished anywhere near Roger before, and he’s doesn’t look like he’s slowed down any. But I was disappointed not to beat Mike. He’s beaten me in the past, but I’ve also beaten him. I was hoping I’d get him this time. Oh well, maybe next year. I just wish I could find a solution to the weathervaning on this boat. It’s a good boat otherwise.
