HPP Video

Finally finished the Hpp video and heres the result. Be sure to watch right o the end for some funny stufff .

laters

Conor

Trip to HPP 2011

Last week myself and the rest of the Sluice Crew headed over to the National Watersports centre in Nottingham. We flew over with the wonderful Ryanair and it took about 40 Minutes. Through the week we had two sessions every day breaking down for lunch in the middle. We all progressed a lot from Daniel finally getting his straight loops to the rest of us getting our Space Godzillas down and even McNastys at times  :D
We had the camera recording every day and I now have 60 GB of footage to trawl threw. Be sure to keep a look out on Sluice Crew youtube for a video soon, It should be my best yet , Maybe take a look at last year's video here to compare:

 And here's a few pictures from the week.

Conor Throwing an Air Loop

Shane Throwing a Godzilla

Robbie Trying a Phonics Monkey

Tom Looping In Top Hole

Daniel Plugging for a loop

Well I will leave you with that, Might see some of you at the Clifden Rodeo this weekend. If you have not signed up already or want more info on it you can find it here.

Laters,

Conor

Longford Canoe Polo Club Championships Weekend

With the rivers in Ireland still dry and a break in the K1 schedule, I took to the road in search of water, friends and something to do!

As it happened I received a call from Niall Power about a canoe polo competition taking place in Longford, a new venue on the calendar………. An offer I couldn't refuse!

With the van loaded I headed for the venue a small village called Clondra, based on the grand canal with the tease of a dry Tamonbarry to keep focused.

The venue was a small harbour basin big enough for 2 regulation size pitches with parking. camping, toilets and shower facilities as well as a pub. what more could be asked!

The event kicked off 10am Saturday with the first rounds of games. each team would play a league event with the top 4 from each division progressing through to semi finals and Finals.

The Sun was out but unfortunately our players weren't with our first game kicking off with only 3 players we held our own keeping the defence tight and looking for the break. midway through the first half the Calvary arrived bringing ‘Turtles’ up to a full team.

We gelled quickly and put out impressive victory's over our 1st four games on Saturday with teams from WWKC, Kilkenny Irish ladies and bad company all stepping aside.

The evening saw the local pub provide a BBQ for competitors keeping every one both hydrated and fed.

Sunday we awoke with games kicking off at 9am, the early start again caught us short once again 3 players with one late arrival saw us 4 against 5 and on the back foot resulting in a close game and our first loss of the weekend, with one league game left we needed the win to keep us top and meant the easier draw for the semi final, this we did with a full team and good goal difference putting us against Kilkenny in the semi in a 1st against 4th encounter,

Since Saturday the Kilkenny team had become seriously stronger with some late player additions including Billy Brett (Freestyle junior team paddler) again we pushed with skill and brute force taking the game and making it ours with what resulted in a comfortable win.

The sun made a brief appearance over lunch whilst the playoffs went on seeing Kilkenny beat the Galway team.

The afternoons excitement kicked off with a golden goal decided in Div 3,

next up Div 2 final saw Turtles against The WWKC team the game was a very close affair with the introduction of the shot clock causing lots of rushing and mistakes from both teams with a simple lob shot from Eric the decider in an extremely close 3-2 win for the WWKC team.

Last game of the afternoon was the div 1 final with the usual suspects of gremlins and WWKC in another heated final with only one yellow card in a hard fought match seeing Gremlins take the win.

Overall an excellent event in a superb venue with nice weather and lots of good polo and professionalism from all.

 

Salmon Leap National Marathon Championships 2011

To mark the clubs 50th birthday Salmon leap took the opportunity to host the 2011 National Marathon Championships, a prestigious race with Irish titles at stake.

For 2011 Salmon Leap set about inviting top European paddlers to attend to really make this a special event. in response World Champion Ben Brown, Rene Olsen, Mark Childerstone and Jon Simmons made the hop across along with other British teams for a great weekend of racing.

Saturday saw the K1 events with a fun race for juniors over a short 2.5km course with 25 participants an excellent spectator sport.

The afternoon kicked off with short course and long courses some fine racing and some fast portages kept the races close with World Champion Ben Brown taking 1st place just ahead of Neil Fleming from Celbridge paddlers

Saturday K1

Sunday went ahead after a night of BBQ and dancing, with the K2 crew boats in action some very noble performances today once again Ben Brown and Rene Olsen just sneaked 1st place by a metre from Irelands powerhouse of Neil Fleming and Peter Egan,

Sunday K2

Once again it was a fantastic weekends racing with some very close races,

Thanks to everyone for taking part, here's a few images captured by Mick Feeney.

Irish Freestyle Cardiff League event

With a successful league underway we move to Cardiff for the next freestyle event,

With the van packed and loaded we leave Dublin for Rosslare with a couple of traffic jams and a lovely girl from Stena phoning us to check where we are, we made it to the ferry,

Once parked up we find ourselves trapped between flood gates and trucks hunting for an exit to the passenger area, the ship was probably the worst ferry imaginable with tight stairs and opera on TV we were trapped.

Stenna Line lost trying to find the van!

Luckily the ship docked 3 hours later and we were free of the ship! (colm is not to book ferry's again!)

Once in Fishguard we headed for Cardiff. Over mountains and down through Welsh valleys.

Once in Cardiff we found the hotel “Future Inn” with its double double bed rooms clean and smart within minutes of the WW Course.

The Day started early with a full Morrison's breakfast before heading to the course to meet old friends and finally get boating,

With the pumps at 8cumecs the course was fast flowing with shallow features and tight eddys this made for lots of fun bouncing around with plenty of rafts to join the affray,

The Course has a lot of potential as an international competition site with moveable features and changeable flow makes for a lot of fun. Probably the biggest draw to Cardiff over other sites fresh clean water and an escalator back to the top, with top class facilities, cafe and changing facilities inc shop. The competition was due to start at 6pm with a flatwater comp scheduled for 4.30pm so with the practice over time for the flatwater, without seeing GB freestyles new scoring system I decided to enter bouncing loops and cartwheels, mcnastys and splits thrown together with party trick and some more loop combos to see what scored with a high calibre of entries linking well practiced routines I wished id read the rules! luckily the scores were released leaving me in third place with a very respectable score of 635 points

The evening saw the course close with the water turned off and the hole altered before being restored to a meaty 12cumecs this saw the course become a completely different game, with the high flow the course changes drastically, big bouncy holes and fast curious waves, and to round it all off bouncing surging eddy's to make you really watch your edges. With no real practice at the new level of feature we were purely their to make up numbers watching guys throw solid rides knowing the feature inside out,

With Coleman up first we cheered on from the side, big aerial loops and clean cartwheels and splits showing off the new home-grown boat design mkII, with a mix of old school ends and new school air Mark was back in the game taking 1st place in the events C1 Category

With the event continuing with junior men, women and finally onto the men's heats under floodlights,

With Ronnie up first in his sherbet coloured all star (the same colour as the water) trying to learn the new feature whilst putting down competition rides was hardly the best preparation but albeit solid rides with unlucky flushes.

Next up was Adrian and Colm in the same heat, with the rain pouring the music was stopped and everyone hid for shelter from the prevailing weather conditions (Except us who were waiting in the eddy) with Colm looking for the split struggling to bring the ends over and just losing out on the pop with a couple of flat bonuses to assist the cause, Adrian was up with a spectacular window shade into head rudder combo we were struggling with the new feature, with a couple of rides left to try and put some points on the board we started to enjoy the occasion and just see what happened a couple of loops spins and cartwheels and we had those much needed points, in the cool evening air we finished our rides and continued to savour the 12 cumec course.

The results were out leaving Adrian 15th, Ronnie 16th and Colm 17th.

The Whitewater course in Cardiff has lived up to and exceeded every expectation a great destination for some away training and close hotels make for a relaxed weekend full of paddling,

Big smiles and thumbs up for Cardiff!

Thank you GB Freestyle for their hospitality and the great event.

.Ad

Timpeall na Tíre 2011 has landed!

We made it!!

After 35 days and 8 hours at sea, Danny and I landed safely back in Howth harbour! To be greeted by a large group of family and friends on a beautiful sunny day.We swiftly moved onto the Findlater to catch up over a few pints of the black stuff!




..the support group..

The journey around Ireland was definitly the biggest challenge that Danny or myself have ever taken on. Especially as neither of us really come from a sea kayaking background(before the trip the longest sea kayak expedition either of us were on was 2 nights!). However it was also the most rewarding! The highlights for me were 3 things: the incredible scenery experienced along the way, the huge amounts of wildlife that we got up close experiences with and the extremely friendly people we met along the way. Even with the recession in Ireland we discovered that the generosity the Irish people our famous for is still strong today! Naturally when people saw the salty state of ourselves many conversations were struck up, the results including; several free dinners, fish off fisherman, houses to stay in, plenty of cash for our charity and even a hotel room to stay in! During the trip the wildlife we experienced also brought uplifting moments to nearly every day. From paddling in massive flocks of seabirds to surfing with dolphins we also got to see whales, basking sharks, otters, dolphins and porpoises and many types of birds.

The trip was challenging mentally and physically for the both of us as we soon realised that our optimistic aim of 30nautical miles a day(60k)in the windy, lumpy weather of the west coast would be quite a challenge! A few days after departing Howth and heading south the strain we were putting on our bodies began to take effect. On the days that we had reasonable weather we paddled for between 8-10 hours during which we were burning 5000+calories. So for the first week or so the muscles in our shoulders ached. After this however we rarely experienced muscular pain, we just felt an endless hunger for food and sleep!

Total days lost due to windy weather: 2 in wexford(we made about 10 miles of progress each day in a force 7 with a reasonable breaking swell). + 2 days in Cork waiting at the Mizen for a gale to die down. Here we tried paddling on the second day only to have to retreat back to Crookhaven. The strength of the wind was incredible!Putting every bit of strength we had into our paddles we were only gaining feet! And it soon became aparent that if anything went wrong we would be in difficulty.
Longest open crossing without a break: Paddling from Streedagh beach we headed straight across Donegal bay to Teelin. This was a distance of 18.5 miles or 37k! It took us about 6 hours as we were paddling in a force 5 cross-on breeze.
Longest day on the water/greatest distance covered: Towards the end of the trip while experiencing nice weather in the northeast we pushed on and hit 50 miles or 100k in one day! This was in two sections a two hour paddle in the morning and a 13 hour straight run in the evening! We stayed in our boats from 12 midday till 1am being powered by haribo and boost energy drink.
Worst downsides to the trip: eating porridge every morning that has been cooked with rehydrated 'Marvel' milk. And getting dumped on in the open sea by breaking waves while you have you relief zip open to go for a pee!Soggy thermals for the rest of the day,not cool!....



4 of my favourite places to sea paddle from the trip:
.(County Kerry)-Leaving Smerwick harbour and rounding Ballydavid head an incredible view of Brandon mountain will greet you. The mountain seems to rise straight out of the water and is surrounded on both sides by cliffs. This is a committing paddle as the next access point is not for over 11 miles, Brandon bay.
.(County Mayo)-A day of island hopping! Leaving inishboffin we headed northeast and took in Inishturk, Clare island, Achill Beg and finished in Achill sound. I really enjoyed this trip as it took in some good distances with exposed crossings open to the Atlantic swell. While we got to experience Irelands island life on some of its smaller islands.(While stopping for 2 hours on Inishturk we met all of one person!)Length of the paddle about,26 miles.
.(County Donegal)-departing from Teelin and heading north west to Malin Beg you will paddle past a well known area of cliffs called the Slieve Liag's. They are a really spectacular spot, distance:8.5 knots. If you want to make the paddle longer we also paddled across Donegal bay on the same day from Streedagh beach in County Sligo. This will add an extra 18 nautical miles.
.(County Mayo)- Paddling from Broadhaven bay around Benwee head and on as far as Ballycastle. You will get to experience some of the spectacular paddling that Mayo has to offer!Rounding a steep and rocky Benwee head you will be welcomed by an impressive view of the Stags and then heading east you will pass by the cliffs just below the Céide fields. This is a beautifully isolated place to paddle with some really nice sand and gravel beaches to stop on along the way. Distance: 22 miles.

The majority of the photos from our adventure have been put into a flickr gallery and are viewable here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/64842897@N05/sets/72157627125107240/


Currently the funds raised for the Irish Hospice stands at over €3000 and with a few more events planned we hope to hit 5k!
http://www.mycharity.ie/event/timpeall_na_tire/

We would also like to thank our family and friends who also helped to make the trip possible: Our parents Marie, Tommy, Fran and John for helping with the restocking of supplies and motivation, the many people that put us up during the jouney Gerry, Nicholas,Liz and Laura, Gay, Joe and Martina, Tom and Marian.
Colm from I-canoe.com for assisting with knowledge and equipment for the trip in any way that he could.
Aswell as Kokatat and Northshore kayaks.
http://www.kokatat.com/


....Soon to follow will be reviews of the kit used during the trip!

Paddy

The Worlds 2011

Just back from Plattling Germany were the ICF world championships was held, i had a great time with my week starting off with an open wave which we could hop on and off to at any time! . people were every where and the place was buzzing with excitment ,people of all nations and countrys were present including some new countries such as india and argentina. the hole itself was very hard to get used to and i couldnt even get around to looping in it which i found very frustrateing , i eventually got there with the help of AD and Tom who had been there before me and where well filled in on how the hole worked.

By the end of the second week i had all the basics down such as cartwheels loops godzillas and spins, at this stage team training had started and it was harder to get on the wave because pretty much all the athletes had turned up, team training was great fun and the team coach adrian was giving us tips and video footage as to what we were doing wrong and how to fix it.The comp came up very fast and my heat was last which i was very thankful for after seen robbies run i was super fired up and i had Tom and adrian for some last minute advice , i started mt ride with a spin and then a loop and after sticking both moved onto a godzilla ,cartwheel and as jasper would say a huge mc nasty. this placed me 10th and into the semi finals where i finished 8 th over all. i had a great time in plattling and would recommend it as a trip it has everything you need!

My friend's interpretation of Paddy and Danny's arrival in Howth tomorrow :)

Emily