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Rolling. That oft mystified kayaking skill that eludes, amazes and delights. People want to learn it. But how many sessions should it take?

Working on your own? This is fine for some folks. Some can watch a video and nail it on their first try.

For most people, a bit of instruction is needed to guide their attempts, provide concepts, and a critical eye on where things went wrong, or what is working.

There is no completely right or wrong answer, but I will say that the basic concepts can be broken down into a few simple components.

• setup (wind up)
• leg drive (hip flick)
• brace (unwind and paddle support)
• timing (putting it all together)

Focusing on breaking down these components into multiple sessions eases the burden on the poor students head, and let’s them progress once they have demonstrated the mechanics of one core piece. This is of course not prohibitive, and many students will “get” it pretty quickly. But my observation has been that it takes an average of three sessions to get “a” roll in the pool.

My own experience was somewhat longer.

I had a roll in the pool when I learned 12 years ago. But it took me another six months to really “get” it. I still practice rolling to this day.

I would encourage students, considering a lesson to actually consider threethe average.

Our package for three lessons for $100.00 is still available.

We still have plenty of lessons to get you on your way to success come spring.

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A while back I wrote an article based on the Qajaq USA fueled discussion about Mentally Preparing to Eskimo Roll. For the uninitiated. An eskimo roll is the ability to right your kayak without exiting. Essentially it is a finesse maneuver where the paddler floats their body at the surface alongside their kayak and aggressively flicks their inboard hip to right the boat. With a little assistance from a paddle/hand/norsaq for support on the surface, the boat rights itself and the paddler can swing their body back, or forward onto the deck and then sit up.

This video is of me performing a Norsaq assisted forward recovery hand roll in a white water boat. This is one of the more difficult hand rolls to perform due to the need to stay close to the foredeck. Though certainly this is not as hard as an elbow roll, or a straight jacket roll.

Culturally within sea kayaking there has been a long standing misconception about eskimo rolling. As coaches we have created a mystique around a very basic skill. We have made it seem as if learning to roll is a mystical power not unlike Yoda lifting the X-Wing fighter out of the Dagobah swamp.

Sea Kayaking coaches have made the roll seem like a herculean, obscure, and dangerous power, rather than the necessary simple gateway skill it is. Part of this is due to the dynamic conditions under which ocean paddlers may voyage forth. Some days may be calm and temperate, some days may be tempestuous, windy and downright gnarly. Based on these shifting conditions coaches wisely instruct paddlers to watch conditions, know your limits, dress for immersion, stay close to shore, and never paddle alone. All sound advice. A capsize would be an unlikely event if you were smart enough to avoid big waves, high winds, and strong tides correct?

Before I tackle the bizarre assumption of an unlikely capsize at sea in a boat that is 20 inches wide. Let’s look at what the moving water crowd does.

Good white water instructors teach every paddler that comes through their programs to roll. It is a necessary skill. It is not an unlikely event that one will be capsized while paddling down a Class III or Class IV rapid. It’s going to happen. So you better be prepared for it. The risks of a wet exit in rapids are fairly high. There are strainers, logs or trees fallen across the river to get yourself or your boat wedged within. Falls or nasty retentive features to suck you under and hold you down also come to mind. Reputable white water schools require that before the students leave class; each must do a roll to run the river. Or they go in a raft. Sounds reasonable right?

So my question is: why don’t Sea Kayak instructors approach teaching the student to roll the way white water instructors do? If we are truly preparing paddlers to kayak on the sea in long skinny boats (at any distance from shore) why don’t we approach teaching the student to roll the way white water instructors do? The risks are no less serious than river paddling. If you go in the drink at sea (or Great Lakes) you can be blown far from shore in cold water and drown within a matter of twenty minutes. How is that less risky than white water kayaking?

Is it the truly unlikely event of a capsize? I performed a google search on kayaking deaths for Washington State and found at least three in the top 10 searches within the Seattle and Bellingham area for 2008. There are four for Michigan. So really how unlikely is it?

Press for paddle sports and specifically kayaking is great. We need more press pointing people to the joy of getting out on the water. Especially getting out on the water under human power. There are far too many people who opt for the cheap thrills of gasoline powered endeavors. For me whether it is cycling, paddling, running, or swimming, I enjoying getting there under my own power. There are certain risks associated with this endeavor. The Bellingham Herald wrote an article Entitled, Sea Kayaking and White Water Paddling as different as night and day. The phrase that really got me thinking was this statement from Dave Johnson of Johnson outdoors about Sea Kayaking,

“Ideally, you should be able to re-enter your boat if it flips,”

And then most poignantly this was said by Dirk Fabian in the article about white water paddling:

“Having a good, solid roll is important; having an experienced group to go with is the most important.”

I do not blame the Bellingham Herald for this misconception. I am happy paddling is getting press. I blame us as Sea Kayaking Coaches, we need to take the Yoda out of the roll and get serious about teaching it as an essential skill to all students who will go to sea. Even if the student is struggling with it, we still need to stress it’s importance. We need to stop making it appear that it is an optional, or nice to have skill. You know…if you were maybe thinking about going to sea. We need to stress the risks of going to sea without a roll in the way that white water instructors stress the importance of the roll for moving water on the river.

Let me know your thoughts on the subject.

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Mentally Preparing to Roll a Kayak

At a very basic level rolling is an entry level skill that allows a margin of safety for paddlers looking to paddle in textured water. Having an unplanned swim can be life-threatening under the wrong conditions. Cold water is the number one reason for a kayaker to learn to roll. Having a nasty swim in cold water can be the end of you. Hypothermia even when dressed for immersion can debilitate a paddler within a few minutes enough that they cannot perform basic motor functions. In addition to this, there are other obstacles to be wary of when dropped in the drink, breakwalls, rocks. In whitewater add strainers, drops, retentive holes, and so on. In the ocean tide races, or rip currents can really move you into places you do not want to go as well.

Learning to roll a kayak can be very easy. Some can learn in one or two sessions with a gifted instructor. Others may take longer. I learned the physical part of rolling in three or four sessions, but it was over a year before I could mentally hang on underneath the kayak when knocked over in surf and then reliably roll up.

For paddlers interested in moving water rolling is a foregone conclusion. If you head out to paddle on the river, or in the surf, you will have to roll sooner or later on any given day.

When learning to roll, these types of paddlers are preparing for immediate application, where as Sea Kayakers, or flat water paddlers seem to be preparing for an unlikely and unwanted event. This is also true in the case of some traditional style paddlers who may over-prepare flat water practice routines, but fail when in conditions.

What this difference ultimately describes is a delineation in mindset of the two types of paddling. Before anyone brands me as anti sea kayaking I will say one is not better than the other. But what we find is a lack of ability to roll from those that do not mentally prepare for it.

A rather heated post got started by Brian Schultz over at the Qajaq USA forum. Brian has some interesting ideas that he expressed at the forum. What Brian tried to outline that we as coaches might be able to train paddlers to roll mentally as well as physically.The gist of the idea is that learning to roll a kayak is one step in a long process towards being a competent paddler in conditions.

Some at the forum jokingly pointed out that paddlers are not trying out for the Navy SEALS. Well that’s true, but taking a page out of their book for mental toughness couldn’t hurt. How can you prepare for your regulator ceasing to function and your mask filling with water on a dive if you’ve never practiced for it? Kayaking has certain inherent risks involved. Teaching someone to roll on flat water and teaching someone to roll because they will get knocked over really are two different things.

An example of this: In Justine Curgenven’s This is the Sea III, Freya’s Hoffmeister’s swim in the Falls of Lora (a Scottish Tidal Race). Freya who is a Greenland Champion roller swam in a nasty tidal race. She can roll every which way AND Sunday, but failed her roll. Question is why? Broken paddle, no? Ejected from cockpit, no? She was most likely not mentally prepared for the event of a nasty, awkward capsize. I’ve been there, we’ve all been there. I am certainly not picking on Freya, it does happens to all of us.

So the question is what can we do about it as paddlers and coaches? Brian suggested a few interesting drills to practice on flat water at the forum. Keep in mind these are best practiced in the pool where it is warm and well lit.

1. Play Games in the pool, such as polo. Pushing the limits of your balance and your reach for a polo ball or an opponent will most likely cause a few capsizes and rolling up will seem easier than having to dump and swim. I learned a lot about my ability to hang on from polo.
2. Capsize in an awkward position with your paddle tucked under your arm or decklines
3. Toss your paddle a few feet away from you, capsize on the opposite side and then swim to it and roll up.
4. Have someone standing next to you hold your paddle for you, capsize then setup and bang on the hull when you are ready for them to hand you the paddle, then roll up.
5. My favorite and this requires willing friends and brave students, have people sit on your kayak and knock you over, see if you can roll them up. I do this with my kids in my surf boat in the pool. Practicing it with and without a paddle is fun too. Make sure to be careful you don’t hit anyone with a paddle.

A few other thoughts are that students have to get it into their heads that rolling is infinitely easier than swimming. They have to hang on, wait for the boat to settle, set up, and then roll up. Most often the biggest reason for failure is a rushed setup.

I love paddling moving water, and rolling has become more or less a non-issue. Being able to focus on what I am doing rather than worrying about survival has been a great boon to my paddling.

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I spent last Saturday in the pool in my sea kayak. It was a frustrating couple of hours relearning skills. I considered myself someone who spent the time in the seat working on their skills. And there I was having to relearn some of the harder rolls I thought I’d already mastered. I hit maybe 5 forward-forward hand roll attempts out of 20. I could not cross arm roll at all, my spine roll wasn’t even close.

Needless to say, I will have to get back in the pool again after Christmas and work hard towards regaining lost ground.

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Rarely in life do you get what you pay for. I got a super deal on a brooks tuiliq. Went out yesterday on Lake Michigan. Beautiful calm day. Garment as expected was a little warm! But as my paddling buddy and I played, I managed to finesse my way through my repetoire of rolls with ease including my forward recovery handroll. Interesting how not wearing a lifejacket changes your mobility. I would never venture out in surf without it, but for a calm play day, why not. Just don’t tell the BCU…

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Leaving a great Cuban themed work party was hard, mohitos on the lawn of the Kellogg’s mansion beckoned. Bocce ball and other diversions abounded just prior to departure for Qajaq Training Camp. I sucked in my temptation to indulge my vices and drive up late in the dark.

I just managed to squeeze in to the event by the grace and effort of Nancy Thorton. So I felt pretty lucky to be driving up to Frankfort at all on a Friday. The weather had turned a little gloomy but my fully loaded Volvo thrummed happily northward up highway 131.

I arrived right at dusk on Lower Herring Lake. Lower Herring Lake is a small inland lake just east of Lake Michigan. I was told the camp could only be reached by boat. So I came prepared to paddle in with all my gear in drybags. I loaded my kayak with the little remaining daylight. I launched my Silhouette and began scanning the shoreline for Camp Lookout. Mist settled over the surface of the lake. It seemed a perfect beginning to the weekend. It seemed like my dream of a summer camp from childhood. A place to go where all the other kids wanted to play the sort of games I wanted to play. It is a lost-boy like camp separated from civilization, insulated for a time from problems. I spotted the camp pretty easily by the 50 or so kayaks piled on the beach and the dock of the camp. Lights were on in the lodge and I heard shouting and cheering. I pulled in and unloaded my “kit”. I walked up a winding set of tree fort like steps to the lodge. I stepped in, feeling like a character out of a bad fantasy novel where the hero (we all picture ourselves as such don’t we) steps into the rowdy tavern just at dusk. I was greeted by a few friendly faces. Alex Pak, Henry and Barb, Dianne Carr, and Nancy Thorton.

Nancy was good enough to show me up some more windy steps to my Cabin, the Eagle’s Nest. She quickly gave me the lay of the land. I changed and headed back down to the lodge for pie.

The events of the first evening entailed a presentation from Dubside, which focused entirely on the Greenland competitions. He also retold a bit of the story of Maligiaq Padilla who did not compete this year due to a boat accident. I was really interested in how interested Dubside was with Maligiaq. He seemed to idolize him in a way that a lot of kids do other sports stars. Maligiaq for all intents and purposes is the Pele or Zinedane Zidane of paddling; he is the first child star of paddling. And he has sort of fallen from his lofty perch by not competing in the last two competitions. And he stated he will not compete again next year. I wonder if Maligiaq is just losing interest, or if maybe he just doesn’t want to be the paddling star anymore? But I think I learned more about Dubside from that presentation than I did Maligiaq. I wasn’t sure what to think at first. He is really small, like Bono. He’s shorter than you think. He is very quiet, very polite, didn’t drink, didn’t eat a whole lot, and didn’t speak until spoken to; unless it was about ropes or rolls. He watched me on Saturday while I was in the water with Cheri Perry doing my forward-forward hand rolls, a cross arm roll, and a spine roll. About every five minutes he would yell to me to come over to the dock where he sat with his camera to give me a few pointers. All of them helpful. I’m not sure I saw anyone else getting that help, so I am not sure if I piqued his interest because of my Silhouette which is larger than the skin boats and the majority of the home built boats, or what. But nonetheless, I appreciated the help. Dubside may be that fantasy warrior we all want to be. The guy with one name, drinking a glass of warm milk in the tavern, waiting for someone to speak to him. Not surprised when the locals gang up on him. The hero then dispatches those violent locals with minimal kung-fu effort and grace.

Saturday morning I tried out a few skin on frame boats with minimal success. A few of the skin boats that folks brought are rolling specific. The paddler is expected to hyper extend their knees in reverse in order to gain entry. When I first tried Alex Pak’s Pete Strand rolling kayak I didn’t think I could get in, and Alex in his casual way says, “You just gotta believe.” With a little further faith in my body’s elasticity I wedged in. Aft laybacks were easy as pie, but forward recovery with my hamstrings being as tight as they are was an impossible dream. The Harvey Golden East Greenland replica was by far my favorite. The upsweep on the stern really makes it turn easily into the wind. Most likely to aid in hunting. Yes, apparently seals can smell. I really enjoyed paddling this boat as it seemed like you really were sitting in another man’s shoes from hundreds of years ago in a way that the other rolling kayaks don’t.

I worked through the morning excitedly with increasing success on my forward recovery handroll. A tuiliq loaned to me by Williard really helped loosen me up. After some thunderstorms in the midmorning, I watched Harvey Golden sew a skin on the Derjip (sic?) kayak. By the afternoon, we were back on the water, and I was getting a lot of help from Cheri Perry, (as stated above). Her main message about my rolling is getting the core torso and abdominal muscles working. Relying on the arms is a weakness that limits rolling. Although she said it in a nice way, it is a common failing of men to rely on their arms. As a result teaching core muscle activity is easier with women, they just, “get it”. I took her lesson to heart and pretty quickly I was rolling up in that forward tuck, nose to the deck with one arm wrapped around the hull. The forward-forward roll sensation went from my earlier one of a floundering hopeful slap, hip snap, and twist, to one of a fluid sweep, crunch and tuck. I think her instruction is pretty good, and watching her work in the water for the rest of the afternoon left me more impressed than I expected.

Dan Segal whom I did not have much of an opportunity to work with also seemed great on the water with students. He listened attentively despite numerous interruptions and bizarre arguments from one student and managed to get the student started on what he needed to work on. His handling of the situation seemed so effortless and so direct that I recognized what I lack as an instructor at times, which is a total focus on the other person and what their needs might be. I asked him later about the situation and he said, “I don’t even hear the words really, just the need.”

Later on while near the dock I watched another instructor giving a demo of side sculling. I was totaled baffled by the instruction, and watched as the student floundered and failed to really effectively side-scull. I noticed that the top hand grip was being reversed intentionally for some reason. Which to me made little sense as it would be the only stroke on the Greenland paddle where your grip really changes. Even from a pure paddling standpoint it removes the ability to link strokes and transition to a brace if need be. The woman who was floundering looked at me with a sort of pleading expression and said “what am I doing wrong?”
So I walked over and showed her how to keep the standard paddling grip, rotate her torso and then slice back and forth. She seemed uncomfortable doing it, and then the instructor who had been distracted for a few moments looked at me, and said, “This isn’t the BCU Keith.” I looked into the water, felt foolish for getting involved, and walked away wordlessly. I recognized immediately that I had walked in-between a husband/wife instructor/student situation. It had nothing to do with me, but I was amused nonetheless at the instructors approach to get me to back off.

Saturday night was a gas. I spent a lot of time with Williard from Massachusetts. We talked a lot about family. We talked about being young parents and how isolating it feels at times, all your friends are still out drinking, partying cavorting, spending money on what they like, when they want, traveling etc; while we go to jobs, have mortgages, and loose sleep over stress, kids, and life. The paddling community is particularly hard on marriage from my limited observations. There are quite a few divorcees. It’s an engrossing hobby with a lot to offer. But at a certain point some folks state boundaries. They say “well this is as far as I can go without pushing the wife/husband over the edge”. Others might cave in and deduce the husband/wife is the problem, get divorced and then discover the whole cycle starts over. Others perhaps really do find happiness with the spouse that shares all their hobbies. I don’t know, certainly I’m not placing any judgement on people who get divorced, but I think I recognize that I push Laura pretty hard at times due to paddling. Williard told me, (perhaps idle flattery and speculation) that he sees someone in me who could easily be as good as anyone, if they had the time to spend. But that I can’t or won’t invest the time. Maybe that’s true, certainly my wife would disagree with both. I am not THAT good, and I have certainly put in a LOT of time already. We shared some single malt scotch. We enjoyed an excellent dinner prepared by Michael Gray and Nancy.

I managed to spend a lot of time talking with Harvey Golden. Harvey is as smart as he seems, if not smarter, he is the pocket genius of the Qajaq USA crowd, someone who really has spent way more time than you can even think about, looking at, drawing, and just speculating on traditional kayaks. We had a great discussion about the Norse in Greenland, Jared Diamond’s book Collapse and its failings, and then a lot of trivial smart-alecky jabberwocky. Due to our similarity in height, weight and lack of hair, I had a lot of people coming up to me and asking very good, detailed kayak history questions. It took all of my willpower not to mislead them with the information I do have about U-Boat types and Napoleonic Age of Sail information. Harvey told me later that I really should have explained to every person that all kayaks were originally designed to have a conning tower with a periscope made of sea ice.

Sunday I spent trying to further perfect some of my other rolls. I tried a few more skin boats too. I sat in on a few lessons with Turner on the continuous storm roll. I managed to give a real bow rescue to one student who got very disoriented during continuous capsizes.

Pretty soon I was water logged and wanted to really paddle. I needed to go somewhere and see something. So I managed to find some folks from Yonkers who wanted to paddle Lake Michigan. Four of us went out to the lake. As we crossed out of the stream from Lower Herring Lake into Lake Michigan we were presented with a beautiful panoramic view of the lake. Bright blue water with a fresh breeze that pushed small whitecaps along the surface. A small swell was building from the north. Along the dunes hang gliders were launching from the peaks. I immediately went into a strong forward stroke push. I felt all my muscles thanking me for pushing forward and my kayak glided over the water and slapped down the back of the waves. I quickly separated from the crowd and had to hold myself back. The others really weren’t up for the ride into the wind and decided to turn around. I pushed on until I could feel myself sweating from the effort and my legs pumped like pistons inside the cockpit. I had made it about halfway to Frankfort in pretty short order. I looked at my watch and turned around. I was rewarded with a beautiful gliding ride back to the beach interspersed with brief intense sprints to catch waves, then edging hard to keep from broaching, coming back online with the wave, and then sprinting again until the nose started spilling water perfectly down wave. I realized how much I love paddling, and that rolling is really more about a means to an end for me. I love the skill building and the challenge of learning all the rolls, but what I really love is paddling. I like having the wind in my face and the open lake in front of me with no one telling me which way to go.

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I’ve had what an optimist would call mixed success with rolling instruction. Ok for clarification of the data pool I will say that I’ve tried to help twenty or so people with a first roll. Which is not many. But out of those twenty, only two actually rolled while I was helping them.

Now I am up to three.

The Kalamazoo Canoe Kayak Club has been sponsoring pool sessions once a week since November. Gabriel, Isabella and I have been going almost every time. Gabriel is getting close on his hip-snaps. But he resists the notion that the kayak should come up first. I think I got the concept across to him when I gave him a kick board and told him to try hip flicking off of it. If he hip flicked hard enough and brought his body up last I would let him come up, and if he tried to sit up first, I would let go of the kick board and he would sink back into the water. Pretty cruel isn’t it?

After I tried this technique on Gabriel, I applied it to a slightly more savvy 13 year old girl named Olivia. I worked with Olivia holding onto my hands while I stood in the water next to her. She would hip flick off of my hands bringing the boat up first and then her body over the back deck. After she did this half a dozen times, I gave her the kick board. I held the kick board at first while she tried to roll. I noticed she didn’t seem to need it very much, so I let go. Next I worked her up to being able to capsize on one side and come up on the other with the kickboard. She got that after a few tries. So I decided to graduate her to the paddle. The big difficulty was getting the paddle to stay at the surface. After I guided her paddle a few times, she got it on her own and was rolling easily. I felt like a champ, despite the fact that I wasn’t the clever one. Her mother was in the stands above the swimming pool watching her roll. The girl’s mother in the stand watching her roll reminded me of _All the Pretty Horses_ by Cormac McCarthy. There is a part of the story where in Mexcio John Grady Cole spends months taming this wild horse he found, and rides it around the pen on the ranch where he works. He wants his mother and his girl to see him ride this horse he just tamed. Mainly because it was the one thing where he was eloquent and beautiful, rather than an uncouth cowboy from Texas with no prospects. When I roll I always look up to see if Laura might be watching. She hasn’t been impressed yet, but I am still trying.

Kids are just easier to teach, especially girls. Boys even at nine, are beginning to think they know everything. At least mine does. I was trying to explain to Gabriel that everyone while surfing/white water paddling should be responsible for themselves. He tried to argue that I could just eskimo rescue him everytime he went over instead of learning to roll. I told him it wouldn’t work. He doesn’t get it now, but I hope he will. Learning to roll is pretty much like the rest of life. It’s about being responsible for yourself when you fail. Being self reliant enough to come up on your own. Of course, if you fail and you really need help, your mates should be there to scoop you out of the drink and put you back in your kayak; but you shouldn’t come to depend on it.

I may use this kick board method with some adults to see how it works. But I think it is a pretty cool toy. The foam board has a lot of flotation, more than the paddle really. It doesn’t complicate things as much as the paddle in terms of: where to put it, how to sweep, etc. And after the student gets the kickboard roll they can graduate to the paddle.

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Minimalism, the art of doing more with less may have a lot to do with paddling.

Rolling in particular has the minimalist bent to it. First you learn to hip snap, sweep and brace with the paddle in order to get oxygen. That’s pretty simple, (relatively speaking). If you decide to get more into this, getting your “offside” roll comes next. This comes next, the ability to roll on both sides, is fairly important as I see it.

If you progress past this you’re off into new territory that is fairly esoteric, but still plainly within reason. There are steyr rolls, reverse low brace rolls, storm rolls, deep paddle rolls, behind the back rolls, and behind the head rolls. See the Rolling Videos at: “Qajaq USA. “:http://qajaqusa.org/Movies/movies.html

Over the last year I’ve been working on trying to get onside/offisde hand rolls, forward and aft recovery. The forward recovery rolls are still touch and go, but I think I have the technique. I just have to try and train my muscles to do it over and over until it is ingrained like the aft recovery hand roll. I’ve got it to the point now where the kids and I can play the tip daddy over game in the pool with
no paddle. I’ve had to push some kids out of the way to get a good sweep and hip flick, but I haven’t had to swim yet!

It occurred to me one afternoon this winter while I was doing a static brace in 34 degree water that there is something sick and wrong with minimalism.

We have all sorts of advantages even within paddling, levers and fulcrums so to speak that allow us to lift the pyramid blocks a little easier, and I try to go back to the deadlift method. Is there a self-destructive bent in this sport.

Why isn’t it enough to be able to roll with a paddle, must I really learn how to roll with my elbow?
I know the answer for me is yes, but why? Is it learning something new? Is it doing the rolls with a Norsaq? (rolling stick). Or is it doing the rolls with a 2 kilo brick that will be the final achievement. I don’t know. I think maybe there is something in human DNA that makes people a little coo-coo. If you learned to fly in an aeroplane would the natural progression be to move to an aerolight, then a glider, then a parachute, and then the acme batsuit Wile E. Coyote uses?
Maybe not.