dufek died of a bad stroke

I wanted to talk about my favorite stroke known as the Dufek Stroke. I can remember the first time I saw this stroke. I was watching a sea kayak movie when I was about 20 years old and saw this stroke. I saw this person spin the whole boat 180 degrees with one stroke. I couldn't believe it! Went to try the stroke myself and discovered it was not as easy as what I saw.

5 parts to strokes: examining the dufek
Hand position - Stacked hands (top hand over bottom with safe shoulder position)
body rotation - body needs to be rotated facing your work
boat tilt - use boat tilt to and edge to carve turn
paddle angle - more vertical has less support but more power moving laterally
Length of Stroke - where is the paddle placed

All Five parts are important and should be considered.

In addition to these five parts is one more concept known as an open face, closed face, and neutral face blade position. Think of this as catching water with the scoop, slicing water, or pushing water with the backside of the paddle.

We will look at the dufek on long boats and should rarely be used for smaller kayaks. The problem with using the Dufek is that it is like turning on the brakes and you will lose all speed but turn sharply.

Lets take a look at my Modified Dufek. Take notice that I initiate the stroke with a sweep stroke - kayak held on edge. I hold the edge, rotate to the lifted side, and place the blade at a neutral position at about my knee. When entering the blade into the water remember you dont want to grab any water yet - Neutral Blade! If placed any further forward the boat will slow, the kayak will turn quicker but will surely loose speed. If you do bring the blade forward you also want to rotate and lean your body forward taking weight off the stern. This speeds up the turn.

The length of the stroke is the nearest to the kayak as possible for maximum effect.



I rarely use a traditional dufek that is placed at the bow. This is even more valuable in white water. If you use this in short little boats you will not turn, but simply spin out. To experiment with the stroke try to place the blade in the water so that it is slicing and not grabbing water -neutral blade - then slowly open the paddle to catch water. Once the boat is turning, close off the blade angle, notice that the boat is still turning without a strong open blade face. You may even notice that the neutral blade position will turn you just as well as the open position without compromising speed. The most important part of the stroke is the initiation of the turn, sweep then bow rudder.

This is Jason Self showing us a great bow rudder. You can read further about Jason at Kayak Angler Blog



Here is another example; the kayak is initiated into the turn with a sweep stroke, body is rotated towards stroke, stacked hands, boat held on edge, and the blade is held at about the knee, but you will see white splashed coming off the blade. A neutral blade will reduce the splashing and keep the boat speed.

Hope this helps out. Of course there are many situations and many different subtleties when using this stroke in different water conditions.

Here is some fun video.



Happy paddlin-

Saltman

Surfing at Short Sands

I have been super busy with school, birthday stuff and life. I did get a chance to do alittle surfing. My back has been hurting me so getting out into bigger waves is to stressful on my body, but I am still trying! I kinda max out about 6 foot or so. I think that this is mostly in my head and the bigger the wave the more time I have to move around the face. I am learning that I like more green water.

It is also important to take off on the green water just before the waves starts to break. This gives a cleaner ride while you are not be effected by the white water.
While at the beach there were several other white water play boats in the surf. They had some surfers trying to get into the waves with them and I almost witnessed some bad surfing etiquette. The one interesting moment was a surfer had established his/her ride on the wave and a kayaker was trying to drop in right above the surfer. The kayaker would launch down the wave hitting the surfer in the legs for sure! Luckily, for the surfer, the slow white water boat couldn't make the drop. I will be writing more soon I hope. Til then here are a few pics from the day.

Birthday Week - Time for Surfing at the coast.

So, I have a big week. It is my b-day this week. I will be seeing the premier of This is the Sea 4 - CackleTV.com - which is going to be a fun event.



So, happens to be My birthday, November 6th, which will be a lot of fun. I am turning 28 this year. There is another great movie coming out soon. Eastern Horizons. I saw my first little sneak view of a trailer and it looks like a great movie. Part of the film takes place where I started kayaking and grew up. BarHarbor Maine. So two awsome movies to look forward too!

Then I am having a get together with Alder Creek Kayak and Canoe staff in additional to many other people. I will be heading to the coast either this Wednesday for some surfing or Next Monday to do some kayak fishing with Jason Self, kayakangler.blogspot.com and Dave Slover (owner of AlderCreek). I hope to get many pictures to post and should have some fun things to read about in the near future. There is so much going on.
Not easy being a full time college student, full time work, and trying to get my play time in. So, check back in a week and I hope to have plenty of pics and adventures to talk about.