Rolling practices

Paddled with Vincent to Grass Island for lunch.  I was annoyed at first, he came late, then he took forever to change and put his things in his locker.  By the time we launched, it was well past 1100.

I paddled Bobby and let him take the tiger on the way to TM.  It was a bit of a struggle, but I managed to keep just slightly ahead of him with a very rapid cadence.  On our way back, we switched boats, he paddled the folding kayak and I took the tiger.  I don't think he likes Bobby at all :-)

He left around 1430, I stayed to roll and roll and roll until well past 1700.  Had to do a wet exit once, when I chain-rolled 4 times and my kayak turned into a submarine.  I also find it much easier to perform full roll without a PFD -- the momentum of falling in drives me all the way to the other side through the water and gives me a nice inertia to complete the roll with.  With a PFD, especially when my tiger is filled with water, sometimes I can't even get it to fully capsize. (Well, I managed, by pushing the wrong knee and even pushing at the cockpit coaming.)

Took what NSM said to heart and kept working on my weaknesses.  Picked up a leaf off the water (and the raccoon turns into a catfish!) and kept it in my left armpit to help me focus on keeping my elbow down.  If I really were to use a 100 dollar note, I'll be broke by now... But once I got used to it, my rolls feel much more solid -- I can tell I was using my torso rotation to right the boat, and not my arms.  The paddle also stayed afloat for much longer.

Next, I worked on the aft-to-fore scull on my way up.  At first I felt sure I was cheating -- my CoG was already inside the boat by the time I had to execute the forward scull, but as my kayak gathers water, I found the forward scull quite helpful and reliable.

My left hand still tends to push out too far, I have to remember to keep it close to my collar bone.  I still can't manage to keep my chin on my shoulder either, I like to take a long, calm, slow break while sculling at 90 degrees before I plunge into the water, so I didn't like having to put my nose under the water as I scull.  Tried a few times to focus on keeping my chin to the shoulder as I roll, I managed it, but it felt all wrong, like I was using too much force.  I'll have to work on that again next time.

The tiger really is beyond repair, the duct tape starts to fall off at an alarming rate to reveal a couple of gigantic holes.  I think, I'll have to look for another tiger soon, I don't even know if I can trust it to take me to TMT and back next Sunday.

Oh, and NSM wrote back.  He's happy to have me in his workshops for now, but he isn't interested in having his own fellowship yet.  Not sure if he's just trying to be humble, or if he didn't want to associate himself with an accident-prone maniac :)