So after a fantastic day on the mighty Susquehanna river for the Aluminum mixed relay on Sunday we were awake and ready at the butt crack of dawn to paddle the 70 Miler on Memorial Day.
There is some history behind the General Clinton Canoe Regatta that I feel like sharing, sorry if this bores anyone but history always interests me. The first time I ever made the trek out to Cooperstown for the regatta we paddled over to this old plaque that is at the start of the Susquehanna River, the plaque was there to memorialize Brigadier General James Clinton and Major General John Sullivan. The story I heard from the folks I was with was that the two Generals devised a plan back in 1779-1780-ish to dam up the trickle of a river that was coming out of Otsego lake and once there was a big enough pool of water they would break the dam and ride the wave down attacking the Iroquois Confederacy along the entire section stretching from NY to PA. At first thought this sounds amazing but once I got down to researching this whole thing it was pretty sad to read of the devastation these two guys brought onto the Iroquois Confederacy. Many areas in Upstate NY are full of interesting battle stories between the Native Americans and the White men and canoeing is of course a huge part of that since it was an easy way to transport supplies for troops back in the day before we had hummers and tanks. I won’t bore you with anymore of the sad details of their campaign. If you’re interested just Google it, there is tons of info out there on it.
 |
| * This photo is from Paul Gruber on Facebook, I do not know him but I know this is one of the best shots of the start! |
So back to the whole point of the trip, to race a canoe 70 miles! We had one of our best starts I can remember at the race this year. The 70 begins in Cooperstown NY at the base of Otsego lake as I mentioned in earlier posts. After the national anthem is sung we are off charging full steam ahead towards a pontoon boat lying out in the fog of the lake. We made it to the boat without any issues at all which is pretty amazing considering there were around 60 racing canoes on the starting line with us. The buoy turn around the boat was clean and we were on our way towards the mouth of the river, we entered the mighty Susquehanna in 8th place overall and second mixed, which is about the best I can recall us doing, great way to start the day!! The first thing shortly after entering the river is a short portage around the dam at the hospital. This portage is so fast that you barely have time to think about running with the boat before you are back in the water about ready to enter “the swamp” We were lucky enough to have Neil my father in law pitting for us (bringing us fresh drinks and anything else we need throughout the course), not only is he a great pit person since he is a racer himself he also managed to get some awesome video for us. Below is a clip of the start out to the boat and then a clip of us coming down the lake into the swamp.
*Just a note at the beginning of this video we are the team to the left of the bright neon green guys, we are wearing white. Just as the gun goes off a team pulls in back of us for a few seconds but we pulled away nicely once we were under way
We had paddled this section of the course on Saturday but nothing really prepares you for the mayhem you can run into on the fast moving currents as you whip through S turn after S turn. They release water from the dam at the hospital so what debris was once pinned securely the Saturday before the race can be wedged lose and sent floating along with the 60 other boats and yourself, exciting!! Not only are you watching out for everyone else as you paddle at top speed but you have large floating and attached obstacles to contend with. After some good jockeying back and forth with a few other mixed teams and some men’s teams in the swamp I was proud to see that we were in 1st place in the mixed division at our first pit stop which was about 2 hours into the race.
We continued down the river drafting men’s teams where we could hoping we could somehow make it up to the leading men’s pack and pull away from the other mixed teams behind us. It was about 3 hours into the race when Dennis and Emma caught up to us, this meant we had 1st and 2nd place together, or so we had hoped. It was nice to have them to chat with and the draft was great at this point in time. Dennis and Emma were good company for us through the wider section of the river known as Goodyear Lake. Neil happened to get some more good video here of us drafting along together with Carina and Andy not far behind.
We had a great portage at the Goodyear Dam, it is pretty steep and was a little slick since the ground was pretty well saturated from the thunderstorms they had been having the week leading up to the race. We made it down to the Oneonta portage without any issues at all. Now from this point on in the race its gets to be a little tough mentally, 4 hours into the race and about 4 hours to go for us. As I mentioned before we changed places quite a few times after the four hour mark going between 1st and 3rd place with Jeff & Kristin, Dennis & Emma. I was surprised how well I felt because I have been prone to stomach issues in these longer races but I think I have finally found out the perfect fuel for the long distances, I could tell you my secrets but then I would have to kill you.
We were now into familiar territory on the river since we had spent a lot of time on the lower 35 the day before by participating in the relay. Believe it or not it helps to come up to something that looks familiar so you can say to yourself “ok I only have X amount of miles till the next relay exchange” It doesn’t mean anything in the 70 but it’s sort of a way to notch off the miles in my head.
The next video is a clip about 4 miles before the finish of the race, we made a great move on the other two teams in the Green Acres shortcut and we gained some distance on them. We decided it was time to make a move with the short distance we had left in the race and the big distance we had on the other teams. This is the toughest part in any canoe race from what I have experienced, knowing when to make a go for it or save enough energy to hold off the other guys is a fine art, we are still perfecting this whole thing but I swear it’s something you can only learn thru experience.
As you will be able to see from the last clip we blew up and did get reeled in by Jeff & Kristen at the very end and Dennis & Emma were not far behind us at all. I was really happy with our finish and the whole race in general. As I mentioned in the beginning of the post its pretty amazing that after 8 hours of racing and a dog fight at the end we finished just as we started going into the river, right next to Jeff & Kristen!
Finishing times on the link below but the first four teams were all from New England and the first three teams were only 8 seconds apart!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment