The Andy Duff Memorial Kaituna Challenge is held annually in the height of summer in Okere Falls. Andy Duff was a local raft guide and kayaker and the race was started by his friends after he passed away while traveling in America. The race is a medley of mass starts beginning with short boats followed by long boats, tandems, sledgers/swimmers then finally rafting.
The racing can get a little bit hectic with everybody looking for a chance to take out the titles but it is all in good spirit with everybody looking out for each other.
Geni took out the women’s sledging title.
I have competed in this fun race for the last 3 years but this was the first time I entered in all 5 disciplines which was pretty full on but I was stoked to make it to the finish line in all 5 races especially the sledging!
My favourite race this year was definitely the raft race, with unprecedented carnage nearly every raft which entered flipped at some point down the river! We were in 3rd position coming up to the waterfall behind the NZ Men’s team and the team from River Rats Rafting. All 3 boats flipped and we managed to overtake the River Rats crew by getting our boat upright at a much faster pace. So in the end we finished in 2nd place behind the NZ men’s team which wasn’t too bad considering that they were recently crowned fastest team IN THE WORLD on that stretch of river.
Sam and Rob going for the carnage award.
Every year a special carnage trophy is handed out to the person or team who create the most epic/memorable carnage during the race. The carnage trophy used to belong to Andy Duff himself so in a way it is the best award. This year the award went to Mike Hudson (the guy with a red helmet in the photo above) who attempted the sledge race for the first time and had some epic downtime underneath the waterfall. Also see below the winner’s of last year’s carnage award.
Also a big kia ora to Douglas McCormick for the photos and for organising the race, thanks Douglas!
I have now been using Palm’s Luna PFD for about a year and after some rigorous product testing on and around many different rivers, countries, and scenarios I feel like I have put it through enough to have a good idea of its performance. I work predominantly as a raft guide, safety/photo kayaker, and kayak instructor as well as kayaking for fun and get in a race here and there when I can. I spend a lot of time wearing a PFD so it’s pretty important for me to have one that is both comfortable and functional.
Enjoying the slides on the Ula River in Sjoa
The Luna PFD gives you good freedom of movement which makes it great to race in…
Bit of carnage, upside down raft, no worries the Luna PFD will float you back to the surface
Good for raft guiding
Even if you’re guiding backwards
Doesn’t ride up when your swimming making it a great PFD to go for a swim in
Unrestricting for kayaking allowing you to get your boof on
Also room enough to get a good tuck on if you’re running bigger drops
Even if you want to dress up in a Santa suit and run down the river the Luna PFD wont let you down!
So in conclusion, I love the Luna PFD, it is by far the best PFD I’ve ever owned (previous PFD’s include Hydraulics River Pro, Stohlquist Descent and Palm AMP vest which I also liked a lot). I was impressed by how well it fits to your body shape, it feels like it hugs you when you’re swimming which none of my previous PFD’s have done very well. I like the mesh inner ‘boob hold in’ thingys which are great for preventing you accidentally flashing people when you bomb off a drop only wearing a bikini cause its so nice and warm. The front pocket is roomy enough to easily fit your basic rescue kit (sling, 3 carabiners, 2 prusik cords, knife, chocolate bar) while also being compact enough that it doesn’t make it difficult to get back on your upside down raft if you’ve flipped.
Also finally and most importantly it has awesome buoyancy. I spend a lot of time swimming, mostly for fun on the Kaituna river because we like to swim down the grade 3 section when its warm, good fitness and also good practice for rescues. The Luna is great for river swimming in that it doesn’t ride up or restrict your movement but it floats you very well. I also had one involuntary swim in Norway where I got a big beat down in a rather small but very sticky hole and after fighting it for a good few minutes I decided it wasn’t letting go, pulled tab, and popped up in time to make quite an epic swim to catch a small eddy before being swept over a big ledge hole. I was very pleased with the PFD’s performance in this situation because it floated me quickly to the surface allowing me to make the eddy in time. Thanks Palm for putting in the hard yards and designing an awesome women’s PFD!!!
This year I decided to go check out the Adidas Sickline Kayak World Championships. Its not the first time I have tried to go to Sickline, I nearly went there two years ago but ended up breaking my collarbone about 2 weeks before the race which put a bit of a damper on that plan. Then last year it was too far to travel but this year I was working in Voss over the summer which is a lot closer to Austria comparative to New Zealand.
This year was a pretty good year to attend Sickline because it is only the 2nd year ever that the race organisers have allowed the women to race on the Wellebruke section of the race course, formerly they were only allowed to race on the section starting at the minus 1 rapid through champions killer and down through a grade 2/3 section. Considering that this year 4 men had DNF results in the race 2 of which were in the top 26 final and only 1 women had a DNF (and she went on to get the 2nd fastest time in the second round) and Nouria Newman’s time in the final would have placed her number 11 in the men’s superfinal, I think its a little bit arrogant of the race organisers to say that only the top 3 or only the top 5 fastest women are good enough to paddle the Wellebruke section. From my experience women are just as rational and level headed as men when it comes to making decisions on what they can and can’t paddle.
Nouria Newman ripping it up on the racecourse
Keeping warm and dry on the glacier melt in my Palm drytop
Martina styling it in some new Palm gears she picked up from the paddle expo
Safety first.. The Austrians love safety and tight wetsuits
Me lining up the boof at champions killer
Finalists
Cheers Olaf and the race organisation crew for and awesome event!
The Sjoa River Festival is a fun kayakers event organised by Simon Westgarth and hosted by Gene17, Strie Strommer, Palm, and Sweet Protection. The week long festival has races and activities ranging from guided beginner trips down more mellow sections of river to races down sections with a bit more gradient.
Kiwi boys Sam, Jamie, and Brendan taking out first place in the teams race.
Due to some spray deck issues Team VRS came in a long way behind first place.
Strie Strommer roasted us some sheep for dinner
Fun slides on the Ula Extreme race
Walking back up for the second round
Final drop on the Ula Extreme race
Ula Extreme Results
Womens Mens
1st Toni George 1st Pavel Andrassy
2nd Lucie Sediva 2nd Egor Voskoboynikov
3rd Zuzuana Balejova 3rd Dag Sandvik
In the Sweet Rumble Finals I held a decent lead until the last rapid where I screwed up and flipped in a hole and missed the final banner. Bummer.
In the men’s rumble final Jamie managed to do some amazing overtaking maneuvers in a stacked final and moved from last place…
… to first place ahead of Egor, Brendan, and Sam.
Simon demonstrating the throwbag olympics
Kayakers and raft guides unleashed!
The sun setting on another great day… At 12pm!!!
Ekstremsportveko or Extreme Sports Week is an international extreme sports and music festival held annually in the small town of Voss in Norway. For 7 days athletes from all over the world converge in the small mountain town to compete for dominance in their chosen sport. It is also a great chance to meet new friends from different disciplines and catch up with old ones.
Women’s raft slalom
The first race for me was the rafting race. This year it was a two part race, slalom first, then head to head. My team won the slalom by a decent margin then narrowly missed out on winning the head to head but as slalom was worth more points we took the overall victory.
Even the safety guys are having a good time
Rafter X final between team Germany and the Voss Rafting Senter (VRS) boys. Team VRS had won the slalom and it was a battle to the end in the raft cross. It was a Le Mans running start and Germany got the start perfect. VRS was chasing them the whole way down the river all that was left was the last rapid. Germany went right and VRS went left they had 200 m left till the finish line and Germany got forced into some rocks allowing VRS to take the victory good work boys!
Voss Rafting boys taking the lead
The groupies cheering on team Voss
Winners!!
This is my 3rd year at Extremsportveko and each veko I try to enter a new competition that I haven’t competed in before. This year my two new competitions were the Amazing Raft Race and the Brandseth Teams Race. and we came first good times
River boarding head to head
Our Amazing Raft Race team, I don’t know why Jordie is so sad about winning this competition!
The Amazing Raft Race is not such a serious race as the slalom and raft cross races. The teams have anywhere between 4 and 7 people of varying abilities, the only prerequisite being that you have rafted down the section once before. The race has a series of clues and challenges, you have to solve the clue to find the next challenge. This year the challenges included taking on the kids high ropes course to find our first clue, some throw bagging target practice, some river swimming, rafting a rapid on the bottom of the upside down raft, and jumping off a bridge, all accompanied by a blow up pool toy.
Finally finishing the race after stopping half way down when my friend got pinned in an undercut wall in the racecourse. We evacuated her no worries and she is much better now. Thanks to the veko team for getting her out safe and also thanks for giving me a second chance to race as I thought I was disqualified for quitting my race to help my friend.
After the individuals race on the Brandseth there is also a teams race. Normally the teams race is on a much longer section and includes some big slides and also a portage but this year due to low river levels we raced on a shorter racecourse. I raced in a team with two English girls Sandra and Jenny and we were the only all girls team in the competition. We came 10th overall which we were pretty happy with then at the prize giving we were surprised to be called up to receive 2nd place in the women’s category and a team that had two girls, Marianne and Katrina, and one guy Mathias, won first place in the Women’s category.
Results:
1st in Rafting Slalom and Rafter X
1st in Amazing Raft Race
1st in Women’s River Boarding
3rd in Brandseth Downhill
2nd in Women’s Teams Race (but first and last really because we were the only women’s team)
I just completed an epic voyage from New Zealand to Norway. Epic because between Jordie and myself we had 1 kayak, 1 mountain bike, 3 BIG bags, 2 backpacks, and 2 longboards… Imagine flying with all of that! Just to make the journey a bit more interesting we brought an additional kayak from New Zealand to drop off in Coloma for a friend, had a ten day stopover in California, and a 2 day stopover in London where we had to haul our excessive amount of gear from Heathrow to Gatwick then get on another plane to Bergen, Norway, catch a bus from the airport to Bergen city centre (which was difficult because the first few bus drivers refused to take a kayak onboard). We were then were picked up by the awesome crew from Voss Rafting and driven to Voss. Phewph! Big ups to all the amazing people who helped us out along the way, especially Sara who drove through London traffic for about 3 hours to pick us up and drive us to Gatwick airport!!!
Anyway, amongst all the chaos, I managed to get in one day of sliding down California granite. Heres some photos.
Jamie and I on Autobahn. The one rule of this rapid is no scouting.
California playground
Blue angel from the top of the teacups all the way through to the bottom of Skyscraper, yeboi!
Christy taking on Plastic Surgery
Boof boof slide
When in Rome, do as the Romans do, when in California… Drive a big truck!
A ‘boof’ according to the New Zealand Whitewater Guide by Graham Charles is an onomatopeia for the sweet sound a boat makes after clearing a nasty drop. Boofing can be a bit tricky to start with but once you get the hang of it you can have a lot of fun launching your kayak through the air and skimming out instead of practising rodeo in the bottom of recirculating drops. I don’t claim to be a boofing zen master or anything like that, I just wanted to share a few simple tips that helped me a lot when I was first learning.
Approach: as you near the drop wait till you see the edge you want to boof from then lean forward and plant your paddle in the lip. Rail towards the side you are boofing on, keeping your paddle vertical for maximum power. Timing is more important than speed and I find it easier to button off paddling a meter or so before the lip in order to place the paddle in the best spot rather than charging in at full tilt and trying to line up your boof stroke at the last minute.
Remember as you boof you will probably turn the nose of the kayak away from the side you are boofing so you can compensate by having your nose turned slightly towards the side you are boofing on.
As you pass over the lip of the drop pull hard on your blade using not just your arms but your whole body and thrust your hips forward.
Now look for your landing spot, when you land you want to be leaning forward. This protects your back by putting it in a stronger position for impact. It is good to have your weight forward as you land because it decreases the likelihood of being back looped into the drop and also puts you in a strong stable position for your next paddle stroke.
Today is officially the last day of summer in New Zealand despite continued sunshine and with days averaging 25 degrees and it has been one of the best summers I can remember so this is a quick recap of some of the highlights.
Working hard or hardly working? This is what I do for a job but usually it’s hard to call it work. Hanging out on the river with your mates and terrifying tourists doesn’t feel like work most days, definitely beats sitting behind a desk. Having a boss who gives you time off to go to extreme races and doesn’t mind if you mysteriously disappear for the winter months is just an added bonus.
New Zealand has a pretty awesome race season with a series of fun races and events. The race season kicked off with a brand new event called the Okere Enduro which was the brain child of Ben Robson. This race follows a similar format to a mountain bike enduro race with teams of 3 one of whom must be female. There was also an option for individual entry if you couldn’t find yourself a team. For the race course you had to paddle down the river, then carry your boat up to a trailer which was shuttling kayaks back to the top, then you had to run up a track back to the starting point and tag your team mate in roughly a 3km loop. The race was run over 6 hours and the aim was to complete as many laps as possible. The winning team (Luuka Jones, Tim Pickering & Pete Lodge) completed 24 laps and the top guy (Jamie Sutton) 21 laps and top girl (Kylie LB) 19 laps pretty amazing effort from all involved especially the volunteers and organisers who made sure everything ran smoothly.
Sophie Hoskins (Third), Luuka Jones (Second), and Toni George (First) in the progressive boater X
The Okere Enduro was followed by the Xmas@Kaituna event which happens every year on the last Saturday before Christmas. This year we had a time trial race down the whole river followed by a progressive boater X over 5 sections of the river then a freestyle ‘expression session’ where everyone just had some fun in the Kaituna hole. The main attraction of the day for a lot of people is the pool toy float where everyone grabs a pool toy from the warehouse then swims down the river holding onto it. I find it takes the ‘this is not a flotation device’ disclaimer to a whole new level.
The next event was the Andy Duff Memorial Race. Race format is a mass start, categories are Short Boat, Long Boat, Duo, Sledge/Swim, Raft. Trophies are given out for first place in each category and a bonus trophy for the best carnage of the day. The winners of the latter category were the crew in the upside down raft in the above photo.
Above Luuka and I battle it out in the Semi Final
The most recent race was the Wairoa Extreme Race, a time trial race down the top grade 4 section of the Wairoa which seeds people for head to head knock out races down a short grade 5 section known as the waterfall and rollercoaster. I ended my 3 year winning streak to lose to Lou Urwin in the final an Kenny Mutton got his own back on Jamie Sutton for beating him last year by knocking him out in the semi’s then cruised past Tyler Fox to win the final.
