The Colorado Kayak Chronicle

Saturday, June 12, 2010

Payette HIGH WATER

This June The Paddling Community of the Payette got a surpise of HIGH WATER. This June was History The North Fork of the Payette got to around 9,000 cfs . Alot of awesome paddlers fired it up. Heres some photos at around 7,000 cfs

Seth Stoenner Stlyin the North Fork

Me Loving the big water

T-Dub Launching a Massive wave in Gang Banger

All photos were provided by Mike Reid

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Teva Mountain Games

Greetings from the Freestyle Circuit! The last competition was in Vail, CO for the Teva Mountain Games. Teva is one of my favorite events because they has so much to offer from SUP races, creeking, mtn biking, and duh kayaking. I arrived on wednesday and spent the first couple of days freezing and practicing. The feature at Vail is computer automated, with a push of a button the inflatable bladders under rubber panels change the feature. The day of the quarter finals the river was about normal level and the feature was good but a little flushy. They cut from 15 or so women/junior women to 10 for semi finals, that was held on saturday. The morning of semi finals the weather was warm and the crowed was excited to see the kayakers. It was hard to do much else besides loop, space godzilla, cartwheels, and entry moves. After two heats of great women competitiors, they made the cut to 5 women for finals. Moving on to finals was Emily Jackson, Tanya Faux, Me, Ruth Gordon and Liz Block. Finals started at 4 pm so I went back to the RV to rest, eat, and get ready to compete in front of a ton of spectators. When I got back to the hole at 4 the river came up about 5oo cfs I am guessing, so the feature turned into a hugh wave hole. The eddy access was one sided and you had to paddle fast to catch it, oh and try not to hit your paddle or head on the bridge. You could still loop and bunt and air wheel but it was really flushy. First place was Tanya Faux until Emily took her last ride and throw a mcnasty which looked super hard and she crushed us. The end result was Emily 1st Tanya 2nd and me Haley Mills 3rd. I am still so honored that I placed with such a tough women's class. The next comp is this weekend at Lyons, CO. I am up here training and the hole is so much fun!! Come check out the games this weekend and stop by the CKS tent and say Hello.

Wednesday, June 09, 2010

Glenwood Surfings

Steady high temperatures in Colorado means summer is finally here. The snow is melting and the rivers are pumping. The last couple of days myself and a whole bunch of others enjoyed high river levels on the Colorado to surf the Glenwood Wave. The line was never short, but I can't complain. It was very enjoyable to hang out in the sunshine and try to catch air and learn new tricks on this epic feature.

Here's some eye-candy.

If there was any question about it before, there is no longer any doubt that the new Pyranha Molan surfs awesome on waves!

Monday, June 07, 2010

Budo Fest 2010 event report

The second annual "Budo Fest 2010" was an awesome event. I will go out on a limb and say that the Embudo race is the hardest class 5 race in the country. Northern New Mexico is the shit! The race starts at the normal put in and ends at my house just after the second canyon. 7 miles of full on class 4-5 kayaking. The format is a timed event. Teams of 3 race top to bottom without stopping. It is brutal. Not for the faint of heart. 3 teams competed this year and the winning time was around 43 minutes. I threw a kink into the event this year and 2nd and 3rd place were decided by this new twist. The teams had to take out at my house and run up to the porch (a couple 100 yards away) and then each team member had to slam an ice cold beer after racing the event. Lets just say that there was some serious up chucking and writhing on the ground while trying to finish the ice cold beers :)

1st place honors go to Matt Wilson, Nate Klema and Ben Luck
2nd place honors got to Javier, Chasen and Eddy Honea
3rd place honors got to Cutch, Rolf and Oliver

Huge shout out to Ed Lucero for making the awesome LED wave trophies. Thanks buddy!

We also had a raffle to benefit American Whitewater in our friend Mitchell Smiths name. You will never be forgotten bro!

Thanks so much to everyone that donated to the AW raffle. AW is a wonderful organization and needs all of our help. Massive shout out to everyone that donated gear for the AW raffle. You guys rule! Thanks to Colorado kayak Supply, Keen, Shred Ready, WRSI, River Gypsies, and Whitewater of the Southern Rockies for all the awesome gear donations for the raffle.

This race would not happen without folks willing to race. Thanks to you racers, the event was very worthy and kudos for sacking up for the FUNNEL....
Big props to the safety crew of Chris, Mike, Jules and Adam. Your presence was awesome....
Photos courtesy of Justin Merritt and atomcrawfordphotography, thanks Justin...
See ya all next year. Beers, Atom....

I'll post my video soon. Enjoy the photos and a video by Mike Hagadorn..