Sioux Falls Whitewater Park organization is hosting their first river clean up. It will be on the Big Sioux River at Lien Park Sioux Falls South Dakota. Lien Park is located northeast of Falls Park right off of Cliff Avenue. Since this is our first river clean up we will just be cleaning a small section of the river from upstream of Cliff down to the end of the park. We hope to get individuals to clean up the shore line by foot, on the river by kayak or canoe, or walking the shallow parts of the river and river bank. Plan to get dirty while cleaning this section.
The reason we picked this section of the river is to show people the potential future site of the whitewater park and this section is used by many paddlers going down the Big Sioux.
It will be Tuesday September 16 at 5:30-7:30 if it even takes that long.
Please join us and tell people to come out and help.
River Clean Up Facebook Event
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Wednesday, August 20, 2014
Falling into Whitewater -- Literally -- Part 2
How does one keep from falling into whitewater?
Bracing the paddle against the water to stay upright and rolling back up if the brace fails.
A roll (a.k.a. Eskimo roll) is essentially a brace done after the boat
has flipped.
 |
| Boat first. Head last. |
What is the secret of rolling and bracing?
Snapping the boat right side up first, before the head comes up.
It
sounds simple, but our bodies instinctively try to get our head upright
first. So many things in kayaking seem upside down and backwards, or
counterintuitive-- rolling is a classic example.
Try this: Start tipping yourself over to the right
while sitting on your couch. How do you get yourself back upright? If
you're like most people, you'll push down with your right leg. But if you tip to the right in a kayak on water and you make that same corrective movement, what is going to happen?
Yep, you'll tilt the boat even farther to the right. Staying upright in
a kayak often requires us to do the opposite of what we instinctively
want to do.
So the key to learning how to brace and roll is training your mind that the boat
has to be flipped up first and only after the boat is righted can you
bring your head and shoulders back over the boat. The head must learn
to love being first-in and last-out of the water.
Watch this video clip and decide which knee pulls
the boat upright after I fall to my right. (The hip snap = cranking the
knee+thigh UP into a thigh pad to pull that side of the boat UP)
The boat comes up first, from a strong hip snap. We call it a hip snap, but you can think of it as pulling the thigh up. (This is an extremely late high
brace or a roll and the right knee is cranking up to upright the boat).
Rolling and bracing are mostly mental skills plus a good hip snap. The paddle plays only a supporting role, so they are skills of finesse not strength.
Watch my right hand stay above water in the next video clip. There is barely any force applied to the paddle. The paddle is a gentle brace. The force of the roll comes from the hip snap.
I've
been quite surprised at how learning new kayaking techniques has tested
both my mental and physical flexibility-- this journey into whitewater
kayaking has been a workout for both the brain and body!
More later, from the Elkader, IA WhiteWater Park-- the Turkey River Gobbler,
helen
helen
Thursday, August 14, 2014
Falling Into Whitewater - Part 1
Installation 1--by Helen
Hello folks! Someone asked if I might write up some of my beginner whitewater paddling adventures, so I thought I'd start with a story about my journey into whitewater paddling.
Becoming a whitewater paddler was not really a goal of mine. Perhaps I got tricked into it. Maybe it was fate, or possibly a logical, necessary next step for an avid recreational kayaker, but for a 50+ year old lady? Who am I kidding? I must have been tricked.
It all started innocently enough, on a sunny warm vacation day, on a beautiful, easy class II section of the incredible Wolf River in Wisconsin-- in what they call a boulder garden. A boulder garden is exactly like it sounds-- lots of rocks, seemingly planted in the river, that a paddler must either navigate around, smash into and/or bounce off of. I navigated (mostly), had a blast, loved the clear water and scenery, but realized I didn't really have any real river running skills. It dawned on me, then and there, that after 14 years of kayaking, a lesson would probably keep me safer as I explored new rivers.
So I went online, found the Wausau Whitewater Park in WI, and signed up for a class. The Wausau park is amazing and on the weekends when water is released from a dam into the course, it is always filled with talented boaters. Lots of students and a bunch of instructors showed up for the classes, but much to my dismay, after 14 years of kayaking I found out I was a beginner. I had never even tried to roll and without a roll, one is a liability in rapids. Without a roll, if your sit-inside kayak flips, you have to hang onto the paddle, try to swim the boat to the shore, and dump out the water before you can climb back in and rejoin your group. It usually takes a partner to help you swim the boat to shore on a river powerful enough to dump you in the first place. So I stayed with the beginners that day, below the course, working with the currents coming out of the whitewater park.
Good kayaking classes are small-- typically one instructor for 4-5 students, so we got some great attention. We were taught many skills:
-- How to wet exit a kayak while wearing a neoprene spray skirt (pull the the skirt off the boat and fall out with skill :-)
--The J-lean that allows the boat to tilt without unbalancing the paddler. That tilt allows one to carve turns and it is also used to prevent the current from catching the side of the boat and flipping it over.
-- The low and high braces, skills that take a bit of practice before they become an effective, instinctively performed action to prevent the boat from flipping over.
-- The hip snap, a key element of a kayak roll and braces.
-- An intro to the roll, but without a nose plug and goggles, I was an uncomfortable, nervous wreck under water.
-- How to ferry from one side of the river to the other, facing upstream right below a rapid.
-- How to enter and exit the eddy current next to a rapid (eddy turn and peel out), using the edge, lean, and a couple of new paddle strokes.
At the end of the day, I was mentally and physically exhausted- what a work out that was! I was also very disappointed that we had spent almost the entire day facing upstream and I had never even entered the whitewater course to run the features. I hadn't learned what I had gone there to learn, and the skills I had been taught would take more time and practice for me to master, so lacking an inner tube and permission, I still wasn't ready to get on the course the next day. (Whitewater parks are a blast for tubing and foam boogy boards but Wausau caters to paddlers, exclusively.)
It wasn't until two months later, as I watched my friend almost get flipped while crossing an eddy line next to a wing dike on the Missouri River, that I realized that the techniques and insights I learned in the class were very valuable and would prevent many potential flips on the Mighty Muddy MO River and any other river I paddled. With a new sense of purpose, I found my swim goggles, bought a nose plug, and practiced calming my mind while upside down in the kayak. I was bound and determined to learn that roll and master the skills to which I had been introduced.
More later,
Helen.
Hello folks! Someone asked if I might write up some of my beginner whitewater paddling adventures, so I thought I'd start with a story about my journey into whitewater paddling.
Becoming a whitewater paddler was not really a goal of mine. Perhaps I got tricked into it. Maybe it was fate, or possibly a logical, necessary next step for an avid recreational kayaker, but for a 50+ year old lady? Who am I kidding? I must have been tricked.
It all started innocently enough, on a sunny warm vacation day, on a beautiful, easy class II section of the incredible Wolf River in Wisconsin-- in what they call a boulder garden. A boulder garden is exactly like it sounds-- lots of rocks, seemingly planted in the river, that a paddler must either navigate around, smash into and/or bounce off of. I navigated (mostly), had a blast, loved the clear water and scenery, but realized I didn't really have any real river running skills. It dawned on me, then and there, that after 14 years of kayaking, a lesson would probably keep me safer as I explored new rivers.
So I went online, found the Wausau Whitewater Park in WI, and signed up for a class. The Wausau park is amazing and on the weekends when water is released from a dam into the course, it is always filled with talented boaters. Lots of students and a bunch of instructors showed up for the classes, but much to my dismay, after 14 years of kayaking I found out I was a beginner. I had never even tried to roll and without a roll, one is a liability in rapids. Without a roll, if your sit-inside kayak flips, you have to hang onto the paddle, try to swim the boat to the shore, and dump out the water before you can climb back in and rejoin your group. It usually takes a partner to help you swim the boat to shore on a river powerful enough to dump you in the first place. So I stayed with the beginners that day, below the course, working with the currents coming out of the whitewater park.
Good kayaking classes are small-- typically one instructor for 4-5 students, so we got some great attention. We were taught many skills:
-- How to wet exit a kayak while wearing a neoprene spray skirt (pull the the skirt off the boat and fall out with skill :-)
--The J-lean that allows the boat to tilt without unbalancing the paddler. That tilt allows one to carve turns and it is also used to prevent the current from catching the side of the boat and flipping it over.
-- The low and high braces, skills that take a bit of practice before they become an effective, instinctively performed action to prevent the boat from flipping over.
-- The hip snap, a key element of a kayak roll and braces.
-- An intro to the roll, but without a nose plug and goggles, I was an uncomfortable, nervous wreck under water.
-- How to ferry from one side of the river to the other, facing upstream right below a rapid.
-- How to enter and exit the eddy current next to a rapid (eddy turn and peel out), using the edge, lean, and a couple of new paddle strokes.
At the end of the day, I was mentally and physically exhausted- what a work out that was! I was also very disappointed that we had spent almost the entire day facing upstream and I had never even entered the whitewater course to run the features. I hadn't learned what I had gone there to learn, and the skills I had been taught would take more time and practice for me to master, so lacking an inner tube and permission, I still wasn't ready to get on the course the next day. (Whitewater parks are a blast for tubing and foam boogy boards but Wausau caters to paddlers, exclusively.)
It wasn't until two months later, as I watched my friend almost get flipped while crossing an eddy line next to a wing dike on the Missouri River, that I realized that the techniques and insights I learned in the class were very valuable and would prevent many potential flips on the Mighty Muddy MO River and any other river I paddled. With a new sense of purpose, I found my swim goggles, bought a nose plug, and practiced calming my mind while upside down in the kayak. I was bound and determined to learn that roll and master the skills to which I had been introduced.
More later,
Helen.
Wednesday, August 13, 2014
Official website is up and running
Hello followers
We wanted to let you know our website is up and ready for viewing. Keep in mind there might be changes in the upcoming months to better the site for viewers.
We hope to change the paddling world in Sioux Falls by expanding people's options and adding more training classes.
Check it out
Sioux Falls Whitewater Park Official Site
We wanted to let you know our website is up and ready for viewing. Keep in mind there might be changes in the upcoming months to better the site for viewers.
We hope to change the paddling world in Sioux Falls by expanding people's options and adding more training classes.
Check it out
Sioux Falls Whitewater Park Official Site
Tuesday, July 29, 2014
Phase I donations for the Sioux Falls Whitewater Park
I am pleased to announce that we are now registered as a nonprofit in South Dakota. We have opened a checking account to start the donation process. Our first hurdle is to get funds for a designer to come to town and get everything rolling. We wont stop fundraising until the park is built we are just in the first phase.
We have set up a PayPal account for companies, groups, and individuals have more options. On the right side bar you will see an option to pay by PayPal or any major credit cards. I have given a few options for price. If you are one that doesn't like to pay online we are also taking mail in donations.
Below is our donation slip and address to send donations.
Also will be attaching the link to donate funds through our PayPal account. This is our first step to raising the funds for the whitewater park and we will be coming up with more fundraisers to help this process hurry along.
Thank you and all donations are welcome.
We have set up a PayPal account for companies, groups, and individuals have more options. On the right side bar you will see an option to pay by PayPal or any major credit cards. I have given a few options for price. If you are one that doesn't like to pay online we are also taking mail in donations.
Below is our donation slip and address to send donations.
Thank you and all donations are welcome.
Ready For Donations
We are starting Phase I out of II for our fundraising campaign. Phase I would be raising funds for professional river restoration company to come in for a site visit, identify site, prepare conceptual design, meet with stakeholders, and conduct cost opinion of the park. If you wish to make a donation please message us or email us at INFO@SIOUXEMPIREPADDLERS.ORG. We have a Bank account and PayPal account set up and will soon have a link set up to make donations easier.
Monday, July 21, 2014
First news article for the Sioux Falls Whitewater Park
Today was a great day and step for the whitewater park. Today was our first news article http://www.argusleader.com/story/news/2014/07/21/whitewater-big-sioux-river/12929333/
We took the interview down at Lien Park on Thursday July 17. It was a nice hot day and the interview went great. We hope to do more articles in the up coming months to promote fundraising which should start in the next few weeks.
Argus Leader Story: Sioux Falls Whitewater Park
We took the interview down at Lien Park on Thursday July 17. It was a nice hot day and the interview went great. We hope to do more articles in the up coming months to promote fundraising which should start in the next few weeks.
Argus Leader Story: Sioux Falls Whitewater Park
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