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26
Jul

Pyranha at the Welsh Rivers Book Launch

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The bible of Welsh river running, first written in the 1990’s by Chris Sladden, has long been the go-to book for river beta for boating in Wales. However, despite two re-prints since it’s intital publication, it hasn’t been available since 2008… the reason being that a new works was in the making.

Patrick Clissold and Tom Laws, two aficionados of all things wet and welsh, have been working with Chris to bring the book bang up to date, with major re-writes of all ~180 rivers, not to mention the addition of a  multitude of new pictures to the book.

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24
Jul

The Loki, bringing style back to kayaking

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Before the Phonix monkey, and the Mcnasty, when the Loop was in its infancy,  and cartwheels were king, kayakers roamed the river looking for rocks to splat and holes to throw ends in.   As boat designs became shorter and the tricks took to the air a style of kayaking was lost.  People tried to replicate this style but the modern boats  in the six foot range didn’t have the same effect as as the old boats with three feet of ends whipping through the air.   Stern squirts almost became extinct.  This year the designers at  Pyranha set out to revive this style and they did it in a big way.

  

The Loki, has revived the old days of downriver play and and added yet another dimension to the already stacked Pyranha boat line.  With  low volume ends reminiscent of the kayak designs from the late 90’s, modern outfitting and design tweaks Pyranha has created a virtual time machine.   The balanced ends with near perfect volume distribution give way to cartwheels as smooth as the deck lines.  The edge is tuned perfectly for gripping a wave for huge carves and forgiving enough boof.  With just the right amount of rocker the hull carries speed to make moves and keeps the bow on the surface while paddling downstream.  The Pyranha signature connect 30 outfitting will keep you comfy and connected to the boat.

  

Who would like the Loki?  Anyone who enjoys running rivers and playing along the way.  Someone who loves modern freestyle but wants to try something different.  People who say, “I’m not a playboater” but want to be better paddlers.  Newer paddlers who are ready for that next step to ramp up their skills.  And pretty much anyone else, I have been having so much fun paddling this boat I have hardly paddled anything else since I got it!

Do yourself a favor and get down to your local kayak shop and demo the Loki, it will change the way you paddle.

 

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22
Jul

Demshitz loves BC

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Update from the Demshitz Pyranha Van.  We just got back into the US after a short but fun filled tour in the wilds of BC.  We took a quick tour of BC, finding that a majority of the classic runs were to high but we were still able to get on a few good runs.  One of our major goals was getting to Skook and surfing Mr. Jed until our arms fell off, we didn’t succeed, we still have arms, but we did surf every minute available.

Pete’s meat glad to be done with the tour.

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18
Jul

Layin’ Bricks on the Cullasaja

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The other night, I found myself in a conversation with a few friends about making decisions about running hard whitewater. I have always been one of the more conservative boaters among the people I boat with as far as safety and walking away from rapids I don’t feel right about goes, and thankfully this has led to a full 8 or 9 years of kayaking injury free (mountain biking is another story) with very few close calls.  We talked about how there is a big difference between watching someone run something then getting up enough balls to fire off it, and scouting a drop, picking out your own line, knowing you can stick it 100% and then executing. As I said this, I began thinking about how long it had been since I had done this. Yeah I have run some difficult stuff the last month or two, but it was all stuff I had done before. Over the spring, I walked away from two bigger drops, Laurel Falls and Big Boy, that I have been thinking about for a while but didn’t feel right about, and watched friends fire them up instead. The next morning I found out I would get my chance to step it up, as a little thunderstorm had brought the Cullasaja up enough for Bricklayer falls to go. I wasn’t off work until 6 but thanks to the long summer days had plenty of time to get over there before dark.  Scouting the drop, I found it to be one of the tighter, more consequential drops, between the 30 – ish feet of drop, recirculating cave on river right, massive piton rock in the center, and exit slot on the left. Due to encroaching darkness a decision had to be made fast, and my thoughts went back to the night before. I felt good, saw the line, and knew I could hit it. I watched Sam fire it up first while I set safety, then hiked up to the top and got in my boat.  I knew I had the skills to make it happen, so erasing any doubt from my mind, I got psyched up and approached the lip. Driving off the left side I got my 45 degree angle set, broke free, caught a little piece of the flake and skipped into the left slot, splatting the big rock and setting it down clean. It felt great to see the line and make it happen while dealing with the big consequences of this drop. Check out the photos below and thanks to Hayley for hiking in and shooting for us!

Sam Causey Dropping In

Coming into the entrance

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Celebrating afterwards!

Clay

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17
Jul

High water Pakistan. I told you so?

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Three years ago I visited Pakistan on my ‘Gap Yah’ and since then I’ve been trying to convince a group of kayakers to return with me to take on the whitewater that I saw. In those three years much of the information I’ve gathered about kayaking in Pakistan is that it is not a summer destination, and that if Pakistan is to be the country of choice for kayaking, then spring and autumn is the time to go as the rivers in summer are just too high. Well, three years have passed, its the peak of the summer now, and this is what we’ve found:

High up at Shandur lake

We’ve been based in Gilgit due to its location right in the center of Northern Pakistan and for the past three weeks we’ve been exploring the catchment that feeds the Gilgit river (known upstream as the Ghizar river). The Gilgit/Ghizar is known well enough within the small groups who traveled to Pakistan in the 80s and 90s for long multi-day trips from high up down to Gilgit town. Due to levels being super high, we’ve not approached it as one long river to tackle, as much of it is broken up by absolutely ridiculous rapids, with 15 foot high holes, and pour overs that have towback of equal length that last for mile after mile. This being said, we’ve found some unbelievable short day trips, most notably the ‘Play run’ and the ‘Aint never gunna be a train station’ section, as well as the local ‘Silverback run’ that flows into Gilgit with two rapids that dwarf the late namesake in Uganda, with similar huge wave trains.

Griff scouting a chunky rapid on the 'Aint never gunna be a train station' section

Roadside fun on the Ghizar

The play run of the Gilgit

High water has meant that we’ve been able to get onto many of the tributaries of the Gilgit/Ghizar river that most groups wont have even seen, which vary from super fun blasts down eddy-less alpine style rivers, to super steep and intimidating creeks rolling over scree slopes, with everything in the middle to keep us entertained.

Endless fun on Singal nala

Super steep Bubbur nala

Along with the Silverback section we’ve found another run for evening blasts when in Gilgit, on Karga nala (which has had at least one previous descent, but on one of the steeper sections in lower water). This has got to be one of the best sections of whitewater any of us have paddled, with nice steep boof moves, hole dodging and long wave trains, all in one jam packed half hour blast.

Scouting Karga nala

Evening blast of Karga nala

So, whilst I’d say yes, high water has made Pakistan a very different destination, it is by no means without vast amounts of whitewater (so much so we’ve sacked off our plans for North India and Nepal and we’re staying till mid-September). Tomorrow we’re heading west over the Shandur pass into Khyber Pakhtunkwa, which is probably the least explored part of Pakistan in terms of rivers and tourism, but from looking at maps we should be in for an awesome adventure of much the same: huge rapids and pristine tributaries!

Whilst we’re off doing that, have a look at some of the crazy portages we’ve found along the way:

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17
Jul

Vallecito creek video

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Finally had some time to edit. this is one of my favorite rivers in the world. Vallecito, Colorado, USA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmWpDQwoYY4&feature=youtu.be

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10
Jul

Kids & Kayaking- U.S. National Whitewater Center

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I started kayaking at a young age, around eight years old.  Back then kids boats were scarce and youth paddling equipment was almost nonexistent.   Over the years with more youth involvement, youth specific gear became available and younger individuals began to make a scene in the kayaking world.  Recently I was able to travel to the U.S. National Whitewater Center and paddle with some young rippers.  Upon arrival, the younger boaters were rock/paper/scissoring over the small Jed and Rebel.  Off the van and into the water, Pyranha boats were occupied with a waiting line for most of the day.  A few of the young local shredders  showed me their skills and favorite lines down the different channels.  It is awesome to see where the sport is going and more youth involvement.  Big thanks to the U.S. National Whitewater Center and all of the locals for coming out to paddle with Pyranha.  Below are a few pics from the day:

-Ty

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10
Jul

RideThePlanet: Caucasus Whitewater

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The first movie of summer season-2012 from Russian freeride media project “RideThePlanet”
about travelling and whitewater kayaking around the globe.
Ride The Planet – the first Russian media project on action sport and travelling, brings together best athletes and mountain guides, professional filming team, action photographers and journalists to make a series of trips to remote regions of the planet, untouched by tourism industry, ethnically appealing and little known to wide audience.
Aim of project is to show, through the eyes of Russian riders, cameramen and photographers, the different mountain regions of planet, convey their beauty and possibilities for travelling and action sports.
In June 2012 the group of 5 paddlers together with filming crew went to Caucasus Mountains to capture their adventure thru different regions of Russian Central Caucasus mountains.
Regions: Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachaevo-Cherkessia and Northern Osetia.
Adidas / RideThePlanet kayak team: Egor Voskoboynikov, Tomass Marnics, Alexey Lukin, Vanya Rybnikov, Dmitriy Danilov.
Camera: Oleg Kolmovskiy, Konstantin Galat.
Edit & Post-production: Oleg Kolmovskiy & Konstantin Galat.

www.ridetheplanet.ru


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09
Jul

Olympic torch visits Lee Valley

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Shortly after getting back from the european championships in Lienz,Austria, I got the chance to head to lee valley and take part in an event to celebrate the arrival of the Olympic flame at the official site for the london 2012 slalom event.

Lee Valley is host to by far one of the best white water courses I have ever paddled, long and continuous with some fairly large drops for a white water course, there is an abundant amount of play features however rescently the course has been fine tuned to fit the slalomists needs and the play features weren’t quite dialled in to what they could be, but were still great fun.

We were paired up and assigned a feature to play in, myself and Dan Chamlet spent most of our time in the hole under the bridge, whilst Josh Wedgwood and Sam Stephenson went to the bottom of the course where a fairly powerfull and sticky hole forms with a small green wave just behind it, We had a great time, with no pressure, as our only instructions where to have fun and look happy. Some big moves were pulled, lots of wipe outs where had, from hitting the bottom of the course and stalling out on loops and some downriver moves where hit along the way, it seemed to go down fairly well with the crowd .

We where mainly filling in the gaps whilst the Gb raft team carrying the Olympic flame made their way back up to the top of the course, Despite valiant efforts by Zack Franklin and the raft team to keep the torch dry, the continuous Lee valley white water course took it’s toll and eventually extinguished the flame, Luckily someone had foresaw that this was quite a likely scenario and a back up flame was nearby to relight it.

The torch then continued on to Newport carried by Jamie Oliver,

Check out the video of Day here : http://www.london2012.com/torch-relay/video/video=torch-relay-day50.html

A huge thanks to Colin Woodgate and the organisers/participants,

See you on the water,

Bren

 

 

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04
Jul

Freestyle European Championships

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Three weeks ago myself and Pringle travelled out to the site of the 2012 Freestyle European Championships in Austria.

We arrived in the small but beautifully located town of Lienz, unfortunately whilst other regions in Austria had huge dumps of snow, it had missed Lienz and so rather than the deep powerful and flushy hole that normally resides here, we were left with a shallow, powerful and highly retentive hole.

We made the most of it for a few days, repeatedly nailing rocks with our carbon boats and playing in the foam pile behind the hole but it wasn’t much fun and not really a good testing ground for the carbon Jed Prototype.

Being located high up in the mountains, Lienz is subject to highly changeable weather … and luckily for us a few days after our arrival the sunshine was replaced with rain, the levels rose rapidly whilst we sheltered in pringles van and within a day the hole was back to it’s full glory.

We had some great sessions in the lead up to the competition and were normally paddling three times a day.

Levels dropped down by the time the start of the event arrived but luckily the organisers had managed to guarantee a medium flow for the hole,

The first day of the competition went exceptionally well, in prelims the riding format is – two rides count and both are added together, the idea of having no throw away rides always makes me nervous, there was some exceptional paddling form all the nations. The results from the first day can be seen below.

The second day allowed the senior men and junior ladies to take to the water. The junior ladies was typically closely fought and some impressive rides were thrown down by the girls in this powerful hole. Jen Mcgally and Kim Aldred from Gbr both made it through to the next round of the competition and Nuria fontanne messo from spain managed to put some fear in the junior boys with some huge space godzillas.

During the mens prelims tensions are always high, with both rides counting there is little room for error, a mistake here will cost you dearly and could potentially stop you from advancing to the next round.

Palms James Bebbington managed to lay down some great rides and secure his place in the next round along with the other members of the Gbr senior team, James Weight, Andy Brinkley and Alan Ward – unfortunately Gav Barker, who has been battling an injury for the past few days did not quite make the cut.

Semi finals took place on day three, again we saw some incredible paddling and more success from the Gbr team, with 3 of the junior boys heading through to the finals and Pringle along with James Weight advancing into the final in the senior mens.

Finals arrived and tensions were once again high everyone in the final 5 paddlers was more than capable of winning,

I didn’t paddle how I wanted to or how I previously had done in the other rounds and  it was an incredibly close fought battle for the title with my buddy James Benns, we’ve been competing against each other in smaller competitions for years and it was nice to paddle with him and my other team mate Sam Stephenson in the final. In the end i finished first just in front of James by 1.6 points ! and Sam Stephenson just a few points behind us finished in 3rd place. Also well done to Brandon Hepburn who paddled really well but unfortunately just missed the final.

The senior mens final was truly impressive to watch, Spains own Quim fontanne meso laid it down and had the rid of his life in the final scoring well over 1000 points in a really trciky feature, the remaining men had a hard act to follow but they all stepped up and  put up some high scores. The results from the mens final was Quim, Sebastian Devred, James Bebbington, James Weight, Peter Csonka.

The senior womens was again won by Marlene from france, who was throwing the biggest loops of the entire competiton, she was closely followed by Nina Csonkova and Maria Lindgren.

Nuria Fonnatnne Meso became the junior girl european champion closely followed by  Lisa Hasselwander and Jana Gross of Germany.

In c1 Lukas Cervinka from Czech succsefully defended his title and won the gold medal, with Philip Hitzigrath of Germany in Silver and Aitor Goikoetxea of Spain in Bronze.

It was an incredible trip, I had a great time and am looking forward to competing more and learning how to show my best.

Huge thank you to all the guys that helped me out !

See you on the water,

Bren

(Pictures by Pringle, Katya and Dennis Newton)

 

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