Sean Morley was feature on the cover of Canoe and Kayak Magazine this month. The magazine has been doing features with some great paddlers, including Shawna and Leon of Body Boat Blade shot by Bryan Smith. This feature on power paddling, shows Sean rocking through a rock solid demonstration of good forward stroke form for power paddling.
The technique is pretty rock solid. I like the part where he talks about glide, as this is has been a focus of mine as of late. The boat does a lot of the work if you let it. Allowing the kayak to glide a bit between strokes can make the distance you travel between strokes longer. I think of it like swimming where you want to rock onto your side and let your body glide through the water with your arm extended to get more out of each stroke. Thank the dear lord, I am faster in a kayak than I am swimming.
One part I am curious about is the yaw, side to side yaw from pressure on the footpegs seems like it might slow you down and perhaps this is overanalyzing. If the kayak didn’t yaw wouldn’t you be faster?…
I like the exercise shown in the video (but not discussed) where the blade completely crosses over during the stroke, and the front blade is held briefly on the “wrong” side of the boat, prior to planting the next stroke. I had good luck trying this out on the water. Despite appearances, it did not seem to groove a stroke that was too long (too far past the hips). Rather, it seemed very effective for grooving full body rotation and a wee bit of the aformentioned glide. Try it!