SWriverstone
Paddler
Hi All:
I've been wondering a lot lately about paddling technique—not in terms of movement of the paddle and body (that's a whole 'nother topic), but in terms of stroke rate versus speed. Bear with me here...
I haven't done any back-to-back tests (and need to), but regardless of my stroke rate in strokes per minute, I normally paddle with no breaks in blade entry (to the water). As my rear blade comes out of the water my front blade is entering the water. Constant, cyclical motion 100% of the time. Put differently, my boat is under forward power 98% of the time (I'm guessing that other 2% accounts for the sub-second delay between the tip of the blade entering the water and full force against the blade.)
Lately, I've been wondering if I might achieve the same overall speed (or something very close to it) with significantly less effort over time...by pausing briefly between each stroke to allow the boat to glide (e.g. "coast" through the water)? I'm not talking about long "recreational lily-dipper" pauses...but maybe a 0.5 to 1.0 second pause.
I should mention that I'm only talking about doing this in long (16' or longer) sea kayaks with good hull speed. We all know there are plenty of rec kayaks out there that have such abysmal hull speed that the split-second the boat is not under power it slows down dramatically.
It seems to me that when you paddle with "constant blade entry" (for lack of a better phrase) you're not really allowing the boat to glide (e.g. "coast" through the water) at all—you're just powering it through the water all the time.
I guess the only way to know would be to do a test: paddle a given distance (the longer the better) in relatively calm, flat water both ways and see what the time/speed difference is using the "constant blade entry" technique and the "pause to glide" technique. It's pretty easy to measure speed over distance. Much harder is to measure perceived effort—but I think you'd still have a pretty good idea.
(I suppose you could also paddle using each technique for a given length of time, like 20 or 30 minutes, and compare how far you paddled each way.)
If (hypothetically) I can maintain 4.5mph over a mile with the "constant blade entry" technique...
...and maintain, say, 4.3mph using the "pause to glide" technique...then my hypothesis is that "pause to glide" would be more efficient over a full day of paddling because you'll be less tired (from the cumulative benefit of all those "micro-rests" on each stroke).
Yes, this is pretty unscientific, I know. LOL I'm not an engineer. All of this is just a hunch based on hundreds of hours of doing straight-line workouts in relatively calm water on big lakes. And yes, I know if we're talking about paddling in big seas and swell with breaking waves, it's probably a different scenario because you'll occasionally be forced to pause in your strokes (because of a breaking wave, or to place your blade just past the crest of a wave, etc.)
Scott
I've been wondering a lot lately about paddling technique—not in terms of movement of the paddle and body (that's a whole 'nother topic), but in terms of stroke rate versus speed. Bear with me here...
I haven't done any back-to-back tests (and need to), but regardless of my stroke rate in strokes per minute, I normally paddle with no breaks in blade entry (to the water). As my rear blade comes out of the water my front blade is entering the water. Constant, cyclical motion 100% of the time. Put differently, my boat is under forward power 98% of the time (I'm guessing that other 2% accounts for the sub-second delay between the tip of the blade entering the water and full force against the blade.)
Lately, I've been wondering if I might achieve the same overall speed (or something very close to it) with significantly less effort over time...by pausing briefly between each stroke to allow the boat to glide (e.g. "coast" through the water)? I'm not talking about long "recreational lily-dipper" pauses...but maybe a 0.5 to 1.0 second pause.
I should mention that I'm only talking about doing this in long (16' or longer) sea kayaks with good hull speed. We all know there are plenty of rec kayaks out there that have such abysmal hull speed that the split-second the boat is not under power it slows down dramatically.
It seems to me that when you paddle with "constant blade entry" (for lack of a better phrase) you're not really allowing the boat to glide (e.g. "coast" through the water) at all—you're just powering it through the water all the time.
I guess the only way to know would be to do a test: paddle a given distance (the longer the better) in relatively calm, flat water both ways and see what the time/speed difference is using the "constant blade entry" technique and the "pause to glide" technique. It's pretty easy to measure speed over distance. Much harder is to measure perceived effort—but I think you'd still have a pretty good idea.
(I suppose you could also paddle using each technique for a given length of time, like 20 or 30 minutes, and compare how far you paddled each way.)
If (hypothetically) I can maintain 4.5mph over a mile with the "constant blade entry" technique...
...and maintain, say, 4.3mph using the "pause to glide" technique...then my hypothesis is that "pause to glide" would be more efficient over a full day of paddling because you'll be less tired (from the cumulative benefit of all those "micro-rests" on each stroke).
Yes, this is pretty unscientific, I know. LOL I'm not an engineer. All of this is just a hunch based on hundreds of hours of doing straight-line workouts in relatively calm water on big lakes. And yes, I know if we're talking about paddling in big seas and swell with breaking waves, it's probably a different scenario because you'll occasionally be forced to pause in your strokes (because of a breaking wave, or to place your blade just past the crest of a wave, etc.)
Scott