My goodness! I don't usually blog on a daily basis, but there's been so much going on, even without paddling.
I posted my thoughts to the WaterTribe discussion forum on paddling whether or not the formal races happen. I heard back from Chief, the original organizer and founder of WaterTribe. He clarified his thoughts as follows: Death happens, things change, people get older, and nobody should put off doing what they want- they should do it now. That's what he meant when he said 2012 might be the last chance. So he encouraged me to paddle the NCC, then the EC, and then the UFC. But that I should start doing these as soon as possible. No problemo!
The NCC is a 100 mile sprint that is supposed to be pretty tough, and a good introduction to WaterTribe events. It's coming up, so I could technically make it to the race this summer. Paddling-wise, I feel prepared for that distance despite not having trained- maybe I'm being cocky, but my off-the-couch abilities would get me though a sprint like that. I could get the charts and tide tables and study up. What I'm *not* prepared with are my safety skills. I don't feel adequately prepared with my rolls, self rescues, and hypothermia kit. I don't have all the gear pulled together for a real overnight race. I'd have a ton of work to do.
I think I could pull it off, but I'm not the only factor involved here. My husband's start-up, to which he is a total slave right now, has almost completed it's initial incubation period, making life in August and September a big unknown. He's still working 7 days a week, and we don't know how soon that will let up.
So a more sane pace might be to not race this summer and fall, and register for some races that are closer to home for next spring and early summer, and also register for the NCC for next year. If I do three or so 100-200 mile races next summer, I'll get to work out lots of the kinks in my gear and skills. Then in 2013 I can do the EC to qualify for the UFC in 2014. That also gives me time to save up for and decide on what boat I want to partner with. (I can't assume Pat's boat will continue to be available to me after this summer).
Still, while the second option is very logical and well-paced, and was closer to my original plans (before my husband got into this start-up business), I haven't totally ruled out making a mad scramble for this year's race. I might just register, and see how close I come to being ready. If I don't think I'm a safe enough bet, and if it stresses out my husband too much, I won't do it.
So for all these musings, what I'm really grateful for is the mental exercise that I had to go through these past few days. Briefly having to consider the loss of the UFC as my goal made me look hard at what I'm doing. Sometimes having something get taken away makes you really examine your motives and the integrity of your goals. I feel a bit more steady now, more independent. Does that make sense?
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Panic response
So. I have to paddle this 1200 miles alone. Sure, that sounds daft- of course I'm doing it alone! It's not like I have a companion boat full of well-wishers cheering me on. What I mean, is that there might be no more official Ultimate Florida Challenge after next year. There might be no more Everglades Challenges, either.
Initially, I panicked. Then I felt pissed. Then I thought, hey, I could drop the whole idea then, do something more sane... not.
This begs the question, what would I do if that were the case?
I would throw myself at the EC 2012 with all I have, for starters. The remaining warm weather this year would be spent drilling rolls and rescues, practicing with the hypothermia kit, and thanks to Colorado winds in the autumn, plenty of fully-loaded wind drills. And practicing loading, unloading, and setting up camp in wind and rain. All my free time would have to go into that, since I would not get to train from late Oct until the race in March.
Then I'd be skate-skiing like mad as soon as the snow falls, plus swimming. There's a group of 'yaks that meet at a swimming pool in January and February that I could review rolls and rescues with once a week. I'd have to do that too. Then, if Pat will let me, I'd see if she'd let me take her sweet boat out for the race. Otherwise, I'll see if I can bum one off of someone else... but that introduces the unknown of a boat I'm not familiar with. I'll deal with that when the time comes, I suppose.
Then what?
Then I paddle the 1200 mile course on my own, either in 2013 or 2014, depending on how the EC goes, and whether I'm ready. I'll have to do a bunch more planning on my own, since there possibly won't be a support group. Or maybe I'll make up a different course of my own of the same length.
All I know is that it's in my head, in my dreams, that I really want to find that deep rhythm of a long trip on the water with my paddle in hand. I really like the idea of doing it to draw attention to a particular cause, too. I'm leaning towards supporting the International Confederation of Midwives, kiva.org, or SeeYourImpact.org (all three are listed at the top of my blog with links- let me know which one you'd go for!). It all just feels right.
I guess I'm having to step back and find the space to unteather from the need to have it be a WaterTribe event. My vision of this doesn't need to be tied to a formal event planned by others. I know that's what inspired me originally, but I don't need to limit myself to that particular event. This realization is invigorating. Even freeing. I would like the camaraderie that a WaterTribe event offers, but in the end, I'm paddling alone either way.
Initially, I panicked. Then I felt pissed. Then I thought, hey, I could drop the whole idea then, do something more sane... not.
This begs the question, what would I do if that were the case?
I would throw myself at the EC 2012 with all I have, for starters. The remaining warm weather this year would be spent drilling rolls and rescues, practicing with the hypothermia kit, and thanks to Colorado winds in the autumn, plenty of fully-loaded wind drills. And practicing loading, unloading, and setting up camp in wind and rain. All my free time would have to go into that, since I would not get to train from late Oct until the race in March.
Then I'd be skate-skiing like mad as soon as the snow falls, plus swimming. There's a group of 'yaks that meet at a swimming pool in January and February that I could review rolls and rescues with once a week. I'd have to do that too. Then, if Pat will let me, I'd see if she'd let me take her sweet boat out for the race. Otherwise, I'll see if I can bum one off of someone else... but that introduces the unknown of a boat I'm not familiar with. I'll deal with that when the time comes, I suppose.
Then what?
Then I paddle the 1200 mile course on my own, either in 2013 or 2014, depending on how the EC goes, and whether I'm ready. I'll have to do a bunch more planning on my own, since there possibly won't be a support group. Or maybe I'll make up a different course of my own of the same length.
All I know is that it's in my head, in my dreams, that I really want to find that deep rhythm of a long trip on the water with my paddle in hand. I really like the idea of doing it to draw attention to a particular cause, too. I'm leaning towards supporting the International Confederation of Midwives, kiva.org, or SeeYourImpact.org (all three are listed at the top of my blog with links- let me know which one you'd go for!). It all just feels right.
I guess I'm having to step back and find the space to unteather from the need to have it be a WaterTribe event. My vision of this doesn't need to be tied to a formal event planned by others. I know that's what inspired me originally, but I don't need to limit myself to that particular event. This realization is invigorating. Even freeing. I would like the camaraderie that a WaterTribe event offers, but in the end, I'm paddling alone either way.
Book review: Without a Paddle, by Warren Richey
An easy read, Warren Richey's book chronicles his efforts at completing- and winning- the first Ultimate Florida Challenge, the same race I hope to complete in 2014. It also examines his divorce from his first wife and eventual romance of another associate later, after starting to heal from the deep wounds of the first.
I am unqualified to speak about his personal life, except that I was a bit uncomfortable with his somewhat negative view of women, which only improved by the end. I hope that means he found peace with my gender. Having seen a close family member struggle with a divorce, I know they are like mourning for a death that is imposed by a loved one (or oneself), which must be incredibly hard to get over. I hope never to experience that grief.
His book appealed to me more for filtering it down to what I need to do to prepare for the race. I would have liked it if he had delved into the challenges of the race a bit more, even. He definitely provided plenty of ideas of things I need to work on.
I discovered, over the course of the book, that SharkChow (which is his official handle) is what we of the climbing community call a sandbagger. Basically, a sandbagger is one who downplays their own ability, making a route sound easier than it is, thus luring others to attempt it. It's not always done with malice, but at times stems from well-meaning but misplaced humility. Some people just don't think they are that far from average when they give estimates of their own fitness or ability, even while they are effortlessly adept. So when I call Warren a sandbagger, he fits the latter category, and I say it with a degree of affection- I am married to a chronic sandbagger, who has taken me climbing far beyond my comfort zone to the point of dry-heaving from effort, when he was convinced it wasn't that hard.
I might be reading between the lines a bit too much, but here's my take on it: SharkChow thinks he's not that athletic, like he was nuts to try to do this race, and yet if you pick up on it, he trained pretty hard, to the point of possibly having an over-training injury. He was not only very fit, he knew how to pack for the race from having done lots of paddling. (Did I mention he completed the 30 day race in like 21 days? Yeah. Sandbagger!)
He had the competitive advantage of having paddled many miles of the racecourse casually over the years- he lived in Florida, and had many hours of sea kayaking under his belt. This leaks out through references in his divorce portions of the storyline. This also means he knew where to camp, having camped at many of the spoil islands that he depended on in the race, and he knew the hazards of the different areas. These are major advantages to have going into such a long race. There is less of 'the unknown' that an out-of-towner like me has to deal with. So a big lesson to me is that I need to make time to paddle sections of this course and explore it before the actual race, so I can plan better. This is a huge lesson to me.
That's not to say that he painted a rosy picture of the hardships of the race. There were certainly plenty of hurdles to clear, from winds, to tides, to the especially unpredictable waves around river deltas where the intercoastal waterways crossed, and other pleasure-boaters hazing small kayaks in heavily populated areas. Not to mention getting lost, getting stuck on mudbanks, and getting blown out to sea. Mostly, he made sleep-deprivation sound like the ultimate demon of the race. It impairs judgment and removes the keen observation that keeps us from making really basic, big mistakes.
Some of the important lessons I have taken away from this, as they pertain to my goal of completing the race safely at my skill level:
1. Slow down, don't try to win: SLEEP. Better to get enough rest to enjoy the trip and avoid dangerous misjudgment. I'm not a strong enough paddler, nor familiar enough with the racing grounds to take risks. Slow, steady, safe. That's my mantra.
2. Have lots of back-up options open at all times: alternate routes, duplicate places to camp close together (you never know how far you'll get on a given day), extra things to eat/drink, and emergency gear. Warren didn't wear his PFD during the race. This to me is a big no-no, but I'm a safety freak.
3. Never take for granted that the weather will stay good. Take advantage of it. This made all the difference early on for SharkChow's race. I know it's not the Northwest, but even Florida gets crummy paddling weather that requires staying off the water sometimes (this was not obvious to me until reading accounts of the race).
4. Really get to know the racecourse as much as possible.
5. Tides can really, really suck.
6. Inflate my tires fully on the portage. Oh goodness yes.
7. Pack light. This one is hard for me. I'm a boyscout at heart, and think I must have stuff for all eventualities. I don't want to paddle a barge through, so I have to figure out how to go light enough to stay fast, while having what I need to stay comfortable.
I'm really glad I got the book. It's very helpful to read a WaterTriber's personal account. I've been trolling for more such stories on the WaterTribe website as well as the blogs different paddles have linked. I hope to meet SharkChow at a race in the next couple of years and thank him. If my memory serves me right, it was his article in the Christian Science Monitor that I read in 2006 that fed my imagination in the first place!
I am unqualified to speak about his personal life, except that I was a bit uncomfortable with his somewhat negative view of women, which only improved by the end. I hope that means he found peace with my gender. Having seen a close family member struggle with a divorce, I know they are like mourning for a death that is imposed by a loved one (or oneself), which must be incredibly hard to get over. I hope never to experience that grief.
His book appealed to me more for filtering it down to what I need to do to prepare for the race. I would have liked it if he had delved into the challenges of the race a bit more, even. He definitely provided plenty of ideas of things I need to work on.
I discovered, over the course of the book, that SharkChow (which is his official handle) is what we of the climbing community call a sandbagger. Basically, a sandbagger is one who downplays their own ability, making a route sound easier than it is, thus luring others to attempt it. It's not always done with malice, but at times stems from well-meaning but misplaced humility. Some people just don't think they are that far from average when they give estimates of their own fitness or ability, even while they are effortlessly adept. So when I call Warren a sandbagger, he fits the latter category, and I say it with a degree of affection- I am married to a chronic sandbagger, who has taken me climbing far beyond my comfort zone to the point of dry-heaving from effort, when he was convinced it wasn't that hard.
I might be reading between the lines a bit too much, but here's my take on it: SharkChow thinks he's not that athletic, like he was nuts to try to do this race, and yet if you pick up on it, he trained pretty hard, to the point of possibly having an over-training injury. He was not only very fit, he knew how to pack for the race from having done lots of paddling. (Did I mention he completed the 30 day race in like 21 days? Yeah. Sandbagger!)
He had the competitive advantage of having paddled many miles of the racecourse casually over the years- he lived in Florida, and had many hours of sea kayaking under his belt. This leaks out through references in his divorce portions of the storyline. This also means he knew where to camp, having camped at many of the spoil islands that he depended on in the race, and he knew the hazards of the different areas. These are major advantages to have going into such a long race. There is less of 'the unknown' that an out-of-towner like me has to deal with. So a big lesson to me is that I need to make time to paddle sections of this course and explore it before the actual race, so I can plan better. This is a huge lesson to me.
That's not to say that he painted a rosy picture of the hardships of the race. There were certainly plenty of hurdles to clear, from winds, to tides, to the especially unpredictable waves around river deltas where the intercoastal waterways crossed, and other pleasure-boaters hazing small kayaks in heavily populated areas. Not to mention getting lost, getting stuck on mudbanks, and getting blown out to sea. Mostly, he made sleep-deprivation sound like the ultimate demon of the race. It impairs judgment and removes the keen observation that keeps us from making really basic, big mistakes.
Some of the important lessons I have taken away from this, as they pertain to my goal of completing the race safely at my skill level:
1. Slow down, don't try to win: SLEEP. Better to get enough rest to enjoy the trip and avoid dangerous misjudgment. I'm not a strong enough paddler, nor familiar enough with the racing grounds to take risks. Slow, steady, safe. That's my mantra.
2. Have lots of back-up options open at all times: alternate routes, duplicate places to camp close together (you never know how far you'll get on a given day), extra things to eat/drink, and emergency gear. Warren didn't wear his PFD during the race. This to me is a big no-no, but I'm a safety freak.
3. Never take for granted that the weather will stay good. Take advantage of it. This made all the difference early on for SharkChow's race. I know it's not the Northwest, but even Florida gets crummy paddling weather that requires staying off the water sometimes (this was not obvious to me until reading accounts of the race).
4. Really get to know the racecourse as much as possible.
5. Tides can really, really suck.
6. Inflate my tires fully on the portage. Oh goodness yes.
7. Pack light. This one is hard for me. I'm a boyscout at heart, and think I must have stuff for all eventualities. I don't want to paddle a barge through, so I have to figure out how to go light enough to stay fast, while having what I need to stay comfortable.
I'm really glad I got the book. It's very helpful to read a WaterTriber's personal account. I've been trolling for more such stories on the WaterTribe website as well as the blogs different paddles have linked. I hope to meet SharkChow at a race in the next couple of years and thank him. If my memory serves me right, it was his article in the Christian Science Monitor that I read in 2006 that fed my imagination in the first place!
Thursday, July 14, 2011
What is discipline?
I've been clinging to this goal of mine since 2006, of doing this sea kayak race... through the births of my two children, through the very slow process of reclaiming my body from major injuries and pregnancies, and through the more recent process of having to put myself on hold yet again to give another person's dream first priority. I'm learning to let go of that a little bit, to relax with this journey, to be okay with perhaps not even making my goal of doing this by age 40. When I've had personal projects in the past, I've pursued them with a rigid, myopic intensity that has been unhealthy. Not this time.
In my hunt for a more balanced lifestyle, I discovered minimalism. At first, I saw it as a means to eliminate clutter from the house, to cut down on the things that needed cleaning, repair, or were simply time-suckers for attention and energy. I thought then I might be able to fit in the work-outs I need to be doing if I cleared out the house more.
Then I thought about how having kids simplified my life for me (an organic form of minimalism), freeing me of social obligations as well as some time-wasting, self-indulgent habits. Instead I had to learn to be continually present for these two little people, in all their intensity and need, and still try to keep a functioning house, farm, and marriage. I've never worked as hard as I have in the past 4 years- not at any of my corporate positions, not in retail.... maybe almost with some of my volunteer/non-profit work, but even then I had projects, dealt with mostly-reasonable adults, and then had breaks- it wasn't relentless. Not like full-time parenting.
This winter I caught a glimpse of getting to do something just for me again, in the form of skate-skiing, and tai chi. And I started getting fit. It felt great. Then this job came up for mu husband, which I totally support, and my paddling had to go on hold, and even tai chi has stopped for the first time. My body has lapsed back to softness. It bothers me. And it doesn't.
I've been giving thought to what discipline really looks like in the face of constant change. It can't be rigid, or it's dead. It can't be a formula- how to eat, when to work out, or how time is spent. It has to be a mental state first and foremost. Discipline must be fluid, elastic, resilient, honest, or it will not survive a day. Change doesn't have to mean failure. It means adapting and being able to continue, even if the outward form shifts dramatically, even unrecognizably.
One of the biggest challenges of the UFC race, being 1200 miles, is the length of it: the boring, repetitive, lonely nature of paddling 16-18 hours a day for a month solid. The relentlessness, and the seemingly slow pace of progress, especially when faced with slow-burn injuries, getting knocked around by the wind and water, and wearing down. I like to think that I'm deep in the mental training for this challenge, and I'm finding what it takes to not get worn down mentally. The discipline of resilience.
Discipline, then, is adaptation. It requires that we constantly evolve.
In my hunt for a more balanced lifestyle, I discovered minimalism. At first, I saw it as a means to eliminate clutter from the house, to cut down on the things that needed cleaning, repair, or were simply time-suckers for attention and energy. I thought then I might be able to fit in the work-outs I need to be doing if I cleared out the house more.
Then I thought about how having kids simplified my life for me (an organic form of minimalism), freeing me of social obligations as well as some time-wasting, self-indulgent habits. Instead I had to learn to be continually present for these two little people, in all their intensity and need, and still try to keep a functioning house, farm, and marriage. I've never worked as hard as I have in the past 4 years- not at any of my corporate positions, not in retail.... maybe almost with some of my volunteer/non-profit work, but even then I had projects, dealt with mostly-reasonable adults, and then had breaks- it wasn't relentless. Not like full-time parenting.
This winter I caught a glimpse of getting to do something just for me again, in the form of skate-skiing, and tai chi. And I started getting fit. It felt great. Then this job came up for mu husband, which I totally support, and my paddling had to go on hold, and even tai chi has stopped for the first time. My body has lapsed back to softness. It bothers me. And it doesn't.
I've been giving thought to what discipline really looks like in the face of constant change. It can't be rigid, or it's dead. It can't be a formula- how to eat, when to work out, or how time is spent. It has to be a mental state first and foremost. Discipline must be fluid, elastic, resilient, honest, or it will not survive a day. Change doesn't have to mean failure. It means adapting and being able to continue, even if the outward form shifts dramatically, even unrecognizably.
One of the biggest challenges of the UFC race, being 1200 miles, is the length of it: the boring, repetitive, lonely nature of paddling 16-18 hours a day for a month solid. The relentlessness, and the seemingly slow pace of progress, especially when faced with slow-burn injuries, getting knocked around by the wind and water, and wearing down. I like to think that I'm deep in the mental training for this challenge, and I'm finding what it takes to not get worn down mentally. The discipline of resilience.
Discipline, then, is adaptation. It requires that we constantly evolve.
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