Workouts
Winters are viewed as the “off season” for many in the sprint paddling world, largely because local water areas may actually be frozen over. Being in sunny and relatively warm California, we can paddle year round. Advanced paddlers and our coaches paddle early on some weekday mornings, even before sunrise, but generally speaking, our club meets just once a week during the winter months doing a longer workout together on the weekend unless weather conditions warrant doing a land workout of some sort instead. Despite California getting a fair amount of rain and some larger storms this winter, we were able to meet nearly every weekend and even held a training camp the first week of January while schools were on break.
Equipment
We purchased a lightly used Hody Sport TK-1 “Marlin” that we had shipped from its location in Florida to Newport, California in late December. Any American paddler will understand when I say the purchasing of sprint boats here is challenging and the logistics are only one part of that difficulty. With the Olympics coming to Los Angeles in 2028, and more European federations selecting both Florida and southern California as winter training spots, we hope that there may be an opportunity to get more equipment at prices our club can afford in the coming years. This boat is a “trainer” – a more stable design and suitable for either beginners or older adults. It goes well with the Plastex boat donated to us this past year.
We also did a bit of resurfacing and repair work on the Plastex trainer:
Competition
Due to various reasons, only two club members could attend the Hal Rosoff Classic at the Newport Aquatic Center in February. Our youngest paddler did quite well though, getting 11th place overall in a field of more than 60 boats of all ages! Races add motivation and he’s now very motivated for improving his skills for Nationals this August.
