With the launch of Dagger’s new Jitsu playboat we wanted to give you some new skills to work on in your shiny new freestyle ripping machines.
Over the course of this year Katya and me will be producing monthly how to videos to help you progress your freestyle skills.
The first one here is on how to do one of our favourite moves: the Phonics Monkey.
What is it?
It’s a 360 degree vertical spin linked into a front loop.
It looks very spectacular, is one of the highest scoring moves and also one of the hardest to master.
How to do it?
Step One: Set Up
Step One: Start up nice and high on the foam pile. Turn the boat so that it’s lined up straight to the oncoming flow. Let yourself drift down towards the seam line with a little bit of edge held on.
Step Two: Initiation
Step Two: Just before you reach seam line reach across the bow with a crossbow stroke to initiate the 360 pirouette.
Step Three: Looking Ahead
Step Three: As soon as you’ve initiated the crossbow pirouette, start looking ahead of the boats rotation.
Step Four: Spotting Upstream & Throwing Loop
Step Four: When you’re getting nice and vertical and your nearing the end of the 360 you want to spot a marker, could be a tree or a slalom pole, anything that is directly upstream of you.
Step Five: The Landing
Step Five: Kicking your Feet Out
Step Five: When you see that marker jump up on your toes into your standard looping position & then kick your feet out straight ahead of you in the direction of that upstream marker. The more aggressive the better at this point.
Get some forwards strokes in to stay in the hole.
How to make sure it scores?
Try to start at a low angle and build up continuously to vertical. Timed correctly this will give you the biggest air and make sure the judges like it.
Make sure you keep the loop nice and straight at the end. (Spot your marker & Kick your feet out in front when you finish the Loop)
Things to watch out for:
Going vertical too soon.
Taking too much speed into the move (that just means you’ll go vertical too soon.)
Reaching out too far on the cross bow. Again this will mean you go vert too soon or hurt your shoulder.
Finally
Get out there and have a go, be patient it will probably be a gradual process mastering this move, but very satisfying when you get it.
Sunshine, 3 Gates, Big Air & Good Friends – Hurley Classic 2012
When I first started competing the ‘Hurley Rodeo’ was the UK’s biggest event, drawing in paddlers from all across Europe for an aerial frenzy on the Thames.
In recent years the event has been on a much lower scale, largely due to poor levels, but this year Jacko from KayakoJacko went all out to bring the festival feel back and turn it back into the booming event it once was. With the boom that’s going on in freestyle right now it seems perfect timing to relaunch the event in this manner.
Jacko definitely didn’t disappoint! We had perfect levels, good weather and over 120 paddlers attending including all the big names: Peter & Nina Csonka, Mathieu Dumoulin, Quim & Nuria Fontane, UK’s Bren Orton & myself and Katya.
So we had World Champions, World Cup Champions, European Champions, Rider of the Year winners, National Champions & past Champions all gathered to do battle on one of the UK’s most iconic spots. Jacko had a treat lined up for us.
A very international eddy queue
Cheesy came down and put up the Palm & Dagger tent to show off the new kit and the Dagger Jitsu. We had all 3 sizes for people to try. They definitely fly here on Hurley!
First up was the final of the British League event. Your best two out of three 45 second rides gave you your final score. I had some great rides getting KY’s, Loops, AirScrews and Panams and thought I might have the win but as it turned out I ended up in 3rd place behind local favourite Alan Ward in 2nd and World Cup winner Peter Csonka taking the win. In the ladies Emily wall took the British title with Nina Csonkova taking the overall Win.
1st place to Peter Csonka
Saturday afternoon gave us a steep ramp into the Boatercross. Carnage ensued throughout but keeping the speed up and avoiding the crashes David Bain sprinted his way to the win.
Sunday was what the weekend was all about really, going big with our friends without the pressure of timed rides. It was a jam session format of 15 minutes and then a superfinals of ICF rules for the top 5. Unfortunately I was a bit too determined to get my KY and wasted too much time and finished way down the list but those who got the right tactic of going big but making sure to cram all their moves into their session came out on top.
Mathieu Dumoulin from France fighting hard into 2nd in the final
Palm’s Seppi going high – Exactly what the Classic is all about!
Palm’s Bren Orton went huge in the prelims and got everyone raving when he got his place in the senior mens final (he’s still a Junior), UK Champion Sam Anderson made it too then we had Quim, Mathieu, and Peter all there. The finals were a great display of the various styles but eventually Peters consistency edged ahead of Mathieu’s fluidity to take the Win, with Quim in 3rd. In the womens Nina Csonkova took the win again with Flea in 2nd place.
The last event of this World Cup series at the Nantahala Outdoor Centre, the biggest event of the 3, is the decider of the whole series. It’s also the site of the next World Championships.
So the results from here will give us an indicator of whose looking good for next years Worlds, what we need to work on and who are the ones to beat currently.
The feature is a challenging powerful hole. All moves go in there, but it’s not an easy feature and you need to be fast and powerful to get good rides. The bonus of this event over the previous 2 was also that we had a full week of practice to get used to the feature.
First up of the competition was Mens Prelims. Cutting the field to the top 20. I’d been resting just having a couple practice rides during the week to give my collarbone a chance to heal up a bit after the Pigeon event.
I was really happy with how I was doing in the feature and how the new Dagger Jitsu is performing for me so even without much practice felt like I could compete well here.
I had really good rides and got 3rd place in the prelims, Peter was 1st and Dane 2nd. In the quarters the last 2 weeks of competition caught up with me and I couldn’t push properly on my right sued and finished up 12th. Happy it total but in need of a few weeks off the water to heal myself properly.
I really enjoyed the feature and am looking forward to being at full strength, trained up and un-injured ready to do battle here next year. I think I stand a good chance
In the finals it looked set to be an epic fight between Peter and Dane who’ve been stepping it up against each other every run throughout the series. Then we had Quim Fontane, Nick Troutman and Jason Craig who could easily step up and match them both to take the win here.
It was actually one of the best finals i’ve seen. Peter looked like he had it won with his first ride score of 1246 only for Jason Craig to jump close in his last ride full of big snappy moves to go into 2nd with an 1186.
Then on his last ride Dane shot into the lead with a huge 1316, with only Peter left to go and have one last shot to beat it.
Peter paddled in and let rip, getting all moves pretty much and fighting his hardest to get the Win, the whole crowd was going crazy for him. We were so happy when the score of 1538 came in! Peter 1st, Dane 2nd and Jason Craig 3rd.
This meant his 3rd win of the World Cup and the Overall World Cup 1st for Peter Csonka!
Really couldn’t have been more pleased for him, he really excelled this series and I can’t wait to get back on the water properly next season and compete in such a strong field.
Also worth an extra mention is the great performance of Jason Craig whose been off the water the last two years since a very serious back injury.
It was so great to see him back on the water paddling so well. Another year of training before Worlds and I think he will be another top competitor to add to the growing list of potential winners.
In the Women’s prelims and semis GBR’s Claire O’hara was leading but the rides weren’t that high scoring. Perhaps due to the difficulty of the feature.
The finals started slowly, the Women were going for the hard moves but missed them mostly, and scores comprised mostly of felix’s and loops. The Hole is tricky and powerful and it’s just not that easy for girls to get the highest scoring moves to go here, it requires a big amount of power and snappiness.
However on their 2nd rides the Women seemed to wake up and started to fight for the medals. Ruth Gordon threw a big ride with some Phonic’s, Mc’Nasties and Loops to get a 495. It was the highest score of the women’s competition so far and it seemed to motivate the women to do their best.
Next was Emily Jackson, getting good phonic’s both ways in her ride coming close and scoring 430. Claire O’hara tried to beat Ruth and Emily and improved on her 1st ride but not enough to move up.
Until the very last ride of the final it looked like Ruth would win. Claire was still sat in 3rd position with her last chance to get the top spot being the last ride of the event.
She really put herself together and went all out going for Switch Mc’nasty, Mc’Nasty, Phonics, Felix, Splits, a huge loop and scored a ride of 633 – a ride definitely worthy of her World Champion status!
She said after the competition that she could not believe what just happened in her rides
The fight in this final was definitely good enough to be a World Championships final. Claire’s score was the highest scoring ride of the series for Womens and in one of the harder features!
Overall Women’s World Cup went to Emily Jackson with Claire just behind in the overall standings taking 2nd.
In the Junior Mens Palm/ GBR’s Bren Orton was once again the one to watch with a win at the last event on the Pigeon, a 1st in the Prelims and Semi’s, his dominating paddling looked like the other juniors would have a hard time beating him at NOC.
In the finals Hunter Katich went huge on moves but just didn’t do quite enough moves to beat Bren. Brandurn Hepburn also of GBR came close too but in the end Bren’s 2nd ride score of 836 was unbeatable and he had the luxury of a victory lap last ride to claim his 2nd win of the series. Bren 1st, Hunter 2nd, Brandurn 3rd.
Despite Bren’s domination of the last two events his unfortunate flush at Rock island made the difference in the end as the Overall Junior Mens winner was Hunter Katich of the USA with a 1st and two 2nds. I’m sure Bren’s great paddling will make him another tough competitor next year in his first senior Worlds.
It’s been a really enjoyable trip. With my injury I wasn’t able to compete on the level i’d have liked to, but was very happy with the results I did get. It’s left me and Katya really motivated to train and get ourselves in the best shape for next season.
The NOC feature might well be changed before next year, we really liked it but regardless of feature next September is going to bring a very good competition.
I only wish it would be events every week with such a high standard to compete in It’s always a bit sad when events like these finish. During the series its like a little life for each event and now its over we have to wait quite a while for the next big event to come around. It also gives us lots of time to prepare and get ourselves on the next levels.
A final Congratulations to the overall winners – Peter Csonka, Emily Jackson, Hunter Katich and Nuria Fontane!
On finals day the European athletes really shone! Winning all kayak classes (only C1 & Oc1 went to USA).
In the Junior Men’s Palm’s Bren Orton dominated as expected to take the win. He won in the first round with a ride that would be unbeatable by the others and then beat his own score with a 1066 in his 2nd ride. Hunter Katt from the USA did come close with a 950 to take 2nd place scoring huge almost on every move.
In the Junior Women’s Catalonia’s Nuria Fontane took 1st again with Germany’s Julia Spaaij in 2nd and USA’s Lauren Burress in 3rd.
In the Women’s Claire O’hara of GBR showed some real consistency to pull off two over 500 points rides. None of the other girls could beat her winning first ride of 586. Emily Jackson got 2nd with Nina Csonkova in 3rd
In Men’s it was an expected battle between Peter Csonka and Dane Jackson. After 2nd rides Dane had taken the lead with a 1373 point ride that looked like it would seal the win but then Peter fought back with an astonishing 1416 going for every move possible in the hole pretty much. Dane as the winner of the semi’s had the last attempt to beat Peters score and came very close with a 1380 but not quite enough. Peter was 1st, Dane 2nd and Quim took a well deserved 3rd place.
I just couldn’t push properly on my right side and finished 5th, I was mostly happy even be in the finals given my collarbone injury. I got an alright first ride of 916 but I hadn’t recovered enough from the previous rounds to compete properly this time.
This was the toughest day of the event for the men with both Quarterfinals and Semi finals in the same day.
It was tough to make top 10, the cut was about 1800 for 2 rides, which is much higher than Worlds was 1 year ago…but for the top 5 it was even harder. We have pretty much all the same competitors as in Worlds but now Dane and Quim are seniors too. Also Tomas Andrassy from Slovakia, Bartosz and Tomasz from Poland have all became a very strong competitors and are paddling on a top level too.
There are now more than 5 paddlers capable of pulling off an over 1000points ride here.
The hardest thing for me is balancing between scoring a good ride but not pushing too hard on my broken bone I came in 8th in the morning, feeling very pleased to make the semi finals. Peter just stole the top spot from Dane again closely followed by Quim.
In the Semi finals we all knew it was going to be a ride of over a 1000 needed at least to make Finals. This time Dane had one of the sickest rides I’ve ever seen (1350) to get 1st ahead of Peter who was 2nd, Quim 3rd, Stephen 4th and myself 5th with 1066points!!!
European contingent is looking strong, with 3 paddlers making the finals. Now its one day off to recover and rest before its time to really throw down properly on Saturday
In the Junior Men’s, Bren had rides in prelims that would have put him 3rd in the Men’s and almost two times ahead of the other Juniors… he looked on fire, getting two trophy moves in his ride even.
Today he was up again in the Semi’s and as expected easily won with 1053 in one ride with USA’s Hunter Katich going very big to get 700points and 2nd place. Also making the finals was GBR’s Brandon Hepburn in 4th place.
In the Women’s Prelims Katya did very good making the cut for the Semi finals. Claire O’Hara from GBR got 1st in the prelims followed by Ruth Gordon, Nina Csonkova and Emily Jackson.
Semi Finals was today and Claire O’hara was looking strong, taking the 1st place again! Katya did very good rides with Entry moves, Phonics and a Loops, everyone was pretty sure she would make the cut but judges thought differently so she ended up 7th missing the cut by 30 points.
We’re both happy with how we did today and ready for a rest day tomorrow, as it’s no water releasing. It’s such a good feature here, one of the best holes we’ve ever paddled, finals should be very interesting. I’m really hoping to recover a bit and be able to show my best.
During the London 2012 Olympics it’s not just been Slalom going on at the Lee Valley Whitewater centre…
Myself, Claire O’hara, Uganda’s Juma Kalikwani, Japan’s Motoko Ishida, New Zealand’s Courtney Kerin, and USA’s Dane Jackson have all been part of team putting on freestyle kayaking displays between the slalom races.
The aim to show freestyle to as many people as possible, get more kids into it and try to raise the sports profile as a whole (and have a good time doing it).
We were on each day in the break betweens finals and medals, or after the heats, so you might have heard or seen glimpses of us on the BBC footage. Unfortunately, I took myself out of the action with a broken collarbone after the 2nd day, having stacked it skateboarding back to the hotel after our show. Hoping to be back on the water for World Cups.
I was using the new Dagger Jitsu proto as my Guigui was deemed to colourful by the Officials, but the Jitsu even it was plastic was actually a joy to use here at Lee Valley, I’m certainly excited to see how the production one turns out, I think Dagger may well have created something quite special.
Been here at the Olympics has been exciting, fascinating and an overall great experience. We had such a fun time with our team. Watching the incredible performances of GB’s C2 crews, especially Tim and Etienne taking the Gold and Silver yesterday was unforgettable. I’ve never been so gripped by an event.
It didn’t matter what nation was racing when someone was on a winning time everyone began to cheer them on regardless! That is what was so great about the crowds here! and they seemed to love Freestyle!
Getting to see how all the various slalom athletes put themselves together trying to show their best, cheering them on and feeling the electric atmosphere has been amazing. The opening ceremony was like nothing I’ve ever been to, I was very impressed.
In my mind the Olympics is about working hard in pursuit of a goal or dream, trying to show the best of yourself and encouraging/ inspiring others with your actions. I think this is exactly what we saw there after you’ve stripped away all the official BS and commercialism at it’s core it’s still a celebration or humanity and how great the World is!
Anyway, here are some more photos of our time showing off Freestyle Kayaking and keep an eye out for the others this afternoon as they put on the last show.
Pringle
P.S. Thanks to Claire, Sportscene and Terry Best for the additional photos…
Finals day started from Junior Girls. 1st place was almost guaranteed to go to Nuria Fontane from Spain and it did. Scoring about 200 points in every round of the competition she was always well ahead of the others. 2nd and 3rd place went to German girls Lisa Hasselwander and Jana Gross who managed to throw loops in the last rides.
Next was Junior Boys. Bren had so far won every round with James Benns always on his heels. Just as we were expecting GB’s James Benns made sure Bren wouldn’t get his title too easily. In the first ride James scored 660 points, setting a very high standard for the winning ride. Bren managed to put together a very good ride and just went ahead of James by 1.667points! Such a close fight they both deserved to win. However Bren became Junior Mens European Champion, James Benns got a Silver medal and Sam Stephenson got a well-deserved Bronze. All 3 medals went to the GB team.
In C1 Lukas Cervinka from Czech got the Gold, with Philip Hitzigrath of Germany in Silver and Aitor Goikoetxea of Spain in Bronze.
Women’s finals went smoothly with no surprises, Marlene of France was going bigger than anyone on her loops and space godzillas and reclaimed her European title with almost the same score as two years ago (about 300), Silver went to Nina Csonkova of Slovakia and Bronze to Maria Lindgren from Sweden.
Last in the day was the Mens Final, and this one didn’t go along with anyones predictions First to go in the final was GB’s James Weight who scored so far the highest ride of the competition in the previous rounds. His style is very interesting to watch – going big on all his moves, throwing backloop to mcnasty combos. Many was betting on him. This time though he didn’t manage to put all this together unfortunately and came away with 4th place.
Second to go was Joaquim Fontane from Spain, I didn’t see his run but after the commentator announced a huge score of 1170 the highest of the competition I knew it would take a magic ride to beat this.
Third to go was Sebastian Devred from France, the most consistent competitor of the event, he put together a very good rides but lacked the spark to get him in first but did get the Silver Medal.
Peter Csonka who had been fighting with his injury all week, still looked very capable of winning here. He so far had been paddling very well even through his pain but on the final day his injury seemed to get worse and he just wasn’t in a good enough physical shape to fight for the medal coming in fifth.
Having heard Joaquims sensational score I actually felt no pressure, I had to go all out to stand any chance of beating him so it was very enjoyable to try my hardest. Unfortunately I didn’t get enough magic in my rides to get Gold so fell a little short getting the Bronze Medal 30 points behind Sebastian.
This meant of course that Joaquim Fontane from Spain last Europeans Junior Champion in his first senior year became the Mens European Champion bringing the second Gold medal of the event to Spain!
It was the toughest final I ever competed in actually and despite not winning was one of the most fun to be a part of. The standard of the Europeans raised a lot since 2 years ago and its no longer a fight between me, Peter and Mathieu anymore its 5,6 or 7 paddlers who are all capable of winning. It does look like a real sport now, you have to be on top of your technical, mental and physical shape and have some magic going on in your ride to win now.
For me its a good enough result to be happy with but sh*t enough to get me motivated for taking my kayaking on a new level.
A great results for GB as a team, a big well done especially to Bren and the Junior boys!
The European Championships 2012 opened yesterday in Lienz, Austria. They held a Opening Ceremony in a 14th century Castle (museum) with free drinks, speeches and a drum performance (just using 2 kayaks).
Lienz is the only place in the World where they would let kayakers into a museum with as many free drinks as they want
Today the competition started from OC1, Junior Men, Womens and C1 Prelims.
The level is a bit different to what people are used to, so its proving quite challenging. (and it’s a pretty tough feature to begin with But the beautiful surroundings, hot sun, mountains, lakes, swimming pools make up for the harshness of the feature.
Junior Mens was dominated by the British team getting the first four places (see results below in photos). Palm Paddler Bren Orton put himself in 1st position a long way ahead with over a 1000 points, getting a first ride that would likely see him in a similar place in the mens.
Womens current European Champion Marlene from France is currently in first place followed by Claire O’Hara from GB. Palms Anne Huebner got through to the semi finals and Katya finished 11th just missing the cut.
C1 prelims were won by GB’s Adam Ramadan ahead of the current European Champions Lukas Cervinka from Czech.
So far you can definitely say that Team GB have dominating the competition, especially taking into account the results in OC1 & Squirt Boats.
Tomorrow the most exciting part coming (hopefully with a K1 men where I’ll get to compete to make the cut to the top 20.
Last Monday evening I arrived in Vail, Colorado the site of the Teva Mountain Games to find barely any water here…I mean literally none!
With the lack of a playspot I spent the first couple of days practicing on the Homestake Creek which although very manky and rocky was actually quite good fun. There was talk of cancelling the Freestyle so I’d thought I better find something to compete in having come all this way
Creeking not really being my forte and only being able to borrow other peoples boats I was pretty scrappy the first 2 runs i did, the last 3 i had though felt better and better, so was feeling I could do an alright run in the race.
To my relief however Clay Wright and the rest of the Jackson crew spent 8 hours dropping in plywood and all sorts to try and make a useable feature and succeeded, allowing the Freestyle event to go ahead after all.
Its very brutal and shallow still but you can do some good moves if you avoid the rocks. Considering when I got here there was only a 1cm deep little hole that looked like you might be able to spin in if you got lucky, I’d call their work a big success.
Thursday I decided not to do the Creek Race and instead stayed and paddled a bunch in the play hole, trying to decide whether to use carbon (very traumatic) or plastic.
The sound of me smashing the bottom in my Carbon GuiGui could be heard back in the hotel…Thankfully Dagger let me borrow a plastic boat to use which is a lot less stressful and actually paddles really well. As much as I enjoyed the stress free paddling of the plastic Dagger prototype I ended up going with my carbon in the end. its what i’m used to and felt most comfortable using with only a little amount of time to practice.
Friday was the day of the Kayak Freestyle Qualifiers the hole was still brutally shallow it is possible to get some sweet rides as long as you manage to keep off the rocks.
The qualifier cut the field to the top 10, with each paddler getting two 1 minute rides both of which counted. For non locals here one of the main challenges of this event is the altitude.
I’d never felt the effects of altitude before coming here but it really does make it hard to breathe. I’d get 3 or 4 moves into a run and be panting hard!
Even with the challenges of altitude and low water though, the comp gave some sick rides. I had pretty good rides, missing quite a few moves from flushing a bit to low down when I tapped the rock but got enough moves stuck in the hole to come in 4th. The only other European in the mens Mat Dumoulin from France had such a sick smooth 1st run then an ok 2nd run to take 3rd with Stephen Wright in top spot followed by Dane in 2nd.
In the Womens Uk’s Claire O’Hara cleaned up with awesome rides with Fonix’s & Mc’Nasties and a bunch of other stuff, very cool to see her doing well over here.
Yesterday brought semi finals in the morning and finals in the afternoon. For semis the top 10 would have looked just as legitimate the other way up, a very tough field of paddlers to get in the top 5 of.
Myself, I had a pretty good 1st ride that would have been enough but I flushed just a bit too far back on a few moves for them to score. I was either smashing the rock or landing too far back in the hole not to flush a bit. Was a bit frustrating for me but theirs always next year. I ended up in joint 8th with fellow euro Mat who also didn’t get that lucky either bit of a weird level that just didn’t seem to work for us.
However it didn’t seem to stop the others throwing some awesome rides. Stephen, Dane & Dustin were all on top form in the hole and in my eyes any one of them could have won, but as the finals came around Stephen was the most consistant at getting a good mix of hard technical moves and big air and even hit a 5 move combo (no easy accomplishment in this hole) to take the Win, 2nd was Dane, 3rd was Dustin.
In the Womens Claire had a sick 1st ride scoring 610 (beating mine and Mat’s score in Semis!) and took the win straight away, 2nd was Haley Mills and 3rd Courtney Kerin from NZ.
Today is the 8 Ball Kayak Race where we race 4 at a time over a short distance with other paddlers paddling at you in body armour trying to stop/ destroy you, qualifiers just been and I made the cut Finals later.
It’s a good time here and nice to get into competing for this season/ meet up with friends I haven’t seen for a while. Bit frustrated to not show my best but some good fire to get me training harder as we have European Champs in Lienz, Austria in just a few weeks.
I fly home tomorrow and drive straight out to Lienz so really looking forward to getting to work on my paddling there.
I came in 8th in the morning, feeling very pleased to make the semi finals. Peter just stole the top spot from Dane again closely followed by Quim.
Finals later.
