Issue 182 - £3.50 Nov / Dec 2015 for Coaches this issue POSITIVE ACTIVE BLADE PRESSURE 03 British Canoeing’s magazine for coaches NEWS ROUND-UP 10 Positive Active Blade Pressure Why using positive active blade pressure is a more stable and beneficial than using low brace. Code for Coaches November / December 2015 Coaching Matters Events 2015 Contents POSITIVE ACTIVE NORTH CENTRAL BLADE PRESSURE 3 Cumbria, West Midlands, Leamington NEWS ROUND UP 10 Bendrigg Lodge, Kendal 15th November 2015 4th December 2015 Details available from Jenna Sanders Details available from Mike Sunderland [email protected] [email protected] Download Event Programme from www.britishcanoeing.org.uk First British Canoeing Level 4 Coaches Qualified. We wish to offer congratulations to the residential camps and distance learning. completing an M.Sc. in Performance first coaches to complete the new British Coaching. The six Coaches; Gordon Brown, Doug Canoeing UKCC Level 4 Performance Cooper, Steve Macdonald, Tom Sibbald, We are now recruiting candidates for the Paddlesport Coaching qualification. The Sid Sinfield, and Oisin Hallissey have next intake, due to start May 2016. qualification is an innovative programme spent the last two years studying for the Applications are invited, with a deadline run through a partnership between qualification and graduated in August. in December. Please contact fiona.fuller@ British Canoeing and the University of They are now all continuing on with their britishcanoeing.org.uk for an application Stirling through a mix of modules, studies taking the final steps to pack. FOR THE WIDEST RANGE OF COACHING COURSES Looking for a white water, sea kayak or canoe qualification? You’re sure to www.pyb.co.uk find what you are looking for within our massive range of year-round courses. www.plus.google.com/+plasybrenin www.facebook.com/plasybrenin www.twitter.com/plasybrenin 2 For more information on available courses visit www.canoe-england.org.uk/coaching/course-dates TECHNIQUES Positive ActiveCode for Coaches February 2014 Blade Pressure By Andrew Bonney About the author I started kayaking at nine years of Introduction age, with friends and by fourteen, White Water Kayaking is a fast growing sport in the UK was teaching at St. Austell Canoe Club, as a volunteer coach. At and around the world; more and more people every year sixteen I went to Duchy, to study are taking up kayaking. As a direct result, the outdoor education and trained in surf kayaking, sea kayaking and advancement and refinement of techniques in recent white water kayaking. At seventeen years old I gained my years has been fast and furious. A revolution in BCU Level 2 Coach Award and by approaches and a near re-invention of the technical ‘what’ eighteen I had attained BCU Level 3 Inland Coach Award. This of paddling. Yet there are still coaches out there teaching naturally led me into a career in outdoor pursuits, where I out-of-date techniques to newcomers to the sport. Why is continued working in water sports gaining more knowledge and there this latency within paddling and some coaches in experience in more remote, the UK? steeper and dynamic environments. Aged twenty-one I adopted a new style of paddling technique which gave me the skills to go after the 5 Star WW Leaders award. This opened up my horizons and following advice I set off to kayak the world - France, Italy, Slovenia, New Zealand, Canada and Chile. During the last five years I have continued travelling and working on rivers with a focus on teaching and guiding kayaking on steep creeks and high volume rivers, combined with raft guiding in between. I have worked with world class professional kayak coaches and paddlers, whom have set their businesses up by teaching kayaking on steep creeks and high volume rivers around the world. Study method This paper will outline teaching techniques as a major argument for why using positive active blade pressure is a more stable and beneficial than using a low brace. I will reinforce these techniques with interviews from pro kayakers, observing pro kayakers, coaches and personal experience. For more information on available courses visit www.canoe-england.org.uk/coaching/course-dates 3 TECHNIQUES Code for Coaches November / December 2015 The low brace is not on the syllabi any students; it holds the student back from more yet it still gets taught! There are Teaching techniques what they could achieve. Modern modern day techniques out there, such Over the last few years, I have been dynamic techniques will lead to a quicker as positive active blade pressure, teaching modern and dynamic techniques grasp of concepts in the dynamic combined together with torso rotation that involve keeping the paddle blade in environment ultimately down time or which offer the white water kayaker far the water as long as possibly needed and leading to a positive outcome for both more confidence and more positive, using the positive active blade pressure the student and instructor. effective outcomes. Until all coaches and to transfer energy through the body, back For example I once coached a friend for a paddlers are updated, understand change into the boat. Based on my observations I few hours before his 5 star assessments and embrace the changes, strokes like the see that my students progress much in the French Alps. He was already a good low brace will continue to be used as a faster with a lot more confidence paddler! However with a few laps down first resort for support instead of the last. compared to watching some other the course and a few technique Presented in this paper are four different coaches teach their students using the adjustments he was performing better techniques utilising active blade pressure low brace. When using the low brace I’ve than ever. Using the positive pressure combined with torso rotation and observed students not having the same from the blade and transferring it through rejecting the argument for using a low success and this is right at the beginner the body back into the boat. Basically, the brace. These techniques are: Paddling white water stage. The most frustrating ability to drive the boat where it needs to down a rapid, breaking in and out, thing for me when I am on the river is go in a more effective way progressed his counteracting and absorbing hits and observing other coaches teaching out of paddling to be solid in high water French boofing-taking off and landing. date styles and techniques to their alps for his assessment. Positive Active Blade Pressure For those of you that are unsure of what positive active blade pressure is, well put simply - put your paddle in the water and pull on it! The resistance on the blade that you feel is pressure. We call this Active Blade Pressure. It is in the water, it (the blade) is being active and getting the pressure from your blade. I would now like to introduce flat water techniques for learning how to use positive blade pressure. First things first! Feeling positive active blade pressure by Initiating a ‘bow draw type’ stroke by slicing the blade from forwards paddling on flat water, is also feeling the support stern to bow (active blade pressure), opening the angle of the you get by forwards paddling. blade to feedback and pulling the water as needed to draw the bow for the turn. For example using slow strokes, extending strokes and following through with strokes to encourage trunk rotation Lastly power out of turn driving the positive active blade and setting up for the next stroke will also enable to hold the whole time and feeling the pressure and support on positive active blade pressure for longer as you build your the blade. momentum while maintaining support at the same time. Using this approach coupled with looking where you are always Forwards paddling is the most used stroke and least practiced heading will enable students to lean their body into turns and the stroke to date. There are many different styles of forwards direction of travel. This will edge the kayak naturally, thus 1paddling depending on the chosen discipline and craft you are in.3 removing one more thing the beginner kayaker needs to worry about as their confidence continues to grow. Having a good forward paddling technique will give more positive outcomes in any environment! Secondly to turn the kayak, keeping a positive active blade in the water at all times; Paddle forward to gain momentum and feeling the positive active blade pressure on each stroke. Figure 1: First time kayaker using this method feeling the 2 The last forwards stroke initiating the way I want to turn. pressure of the blade and having great confidence. 4 For more information on available courses visit www.canoe-england.org.uk/coaching/course-dates Moving Code for Coaches November / December 2015 water The eddy line is the Paddling down a rapid dynamic frontier If intimidated, a beginner paddler running the corner and make safe decisions to lead between moving and a 100 meter class II rapid will try and put as others down the river. We can do this by many strokes in as they can to get down, or using the natural lateral momentum of the static water - resort to a low brace! This may seem river - As the river progresses the current crossing this strange but if we were to slow the paddle deflects off the outside corner of the river rate down to five strokes as we paddle the and pushes back the opposite way. We environment is the 100 meter rapid, then they would feel the want to drive the boat laterally using this most common pressure on the blade.