Standup Zone Forum
Stand Up Paddle => Technique => Topic started by: Wetstuff on October 22, 2015, 01:58:58 PM
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Soon as I get there.. F-Me, a SW has switched sideshore so, rather than fight it, I simply went over the dune to paddle bayside. I'm getting so I remember 'the triangle' .. 'stacked shoulders' .. not stroking past my feet.. But how in the hell do you plant the blade and pull yourself to it - the blade. All I seem to come up with something resembling a cripple's doggie style?!
I keep reading 'Once you feel it.' Maybe one of you has an can explain what you are feeling and what parts of the body do they originate in. Thanks. Jim
...and how's come the young fellow in the Naish animated GIF above this posting window is not stacking his shoulders?
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I've never seen the value of that idea, especially since every paddle has slip. But I guess if it helps people concentrate on the catch, then it's useful. Paddling with good form is at least ten times harder than it seems. It takes about a year of practice to really get a stroke, and then a couple more to fix the stuff you're doing wrong. I've watched Dave Kalama tweak his stroke and his teaching methods for the last eight years, and he was working hard on it long before I really met him, other than a brief encounter in Hood River at the first Naish races a zillion years ago.
That might seem discouraging, but really you gain stuff every day you concentrate on your stroke.
The first thing you'll likely really feel is the first time you get your hips engaged. Suddenly you have this added power that comes without effort. It will come and go as you try to incorporate it into your stroke, but it's there when you need it. Everything else is pretty subtle, and shows up better on a GPS than as a "feel". You need about a ten percent change to feel a difference, and that's hard to come by in a single increment.
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Walk to the nearest stop sign, grab the pole and pull yourself to it. That's how you want to treat your paddle, like it's set in concrete. You'll pull differently, I promise.
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Soon as I get there.. F-Me, a SW has switched sideshore so, rather than fight it, I simply went ove .. But how in the hell do you plant the blade and pull yourself to it - the blade. All I seem to come up with something resembling a cripple's doggie style?!
I keep reading 'Once you feel it.' Maybe one of you has an can explain what you are feeling and what parts of the body do they originate in. Thanks. Jim
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To clarify in case you mis interpreted, it's pull yourself PAST the paddle not TO the paddle. This makes you use your torso for the power rather than arms\shoulders.
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After spending the day with Kalama in Hood River, the two main feelings were
1) A surprising amount of downward motion to plant the blade in the water for the catch.
2) As Pono mentions, engaging the hips in the stroke.
After planting the blade solidly, the key for me was the thought of bringing my hip forward to meet my bottom hand during the stroke. The power increase for me was significant and noticeable.
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Soon as I get there.. F-Me, a SW has switched sideshore so, rather than fight it, I simply went ove .. But how in the hell do you plant the blade and pull yourself to it - the blade. All I seem to come up with something resembling a cripple's doggie style?!
I keep reading 'Once you feel it.' Maybe one of you has an can explain what you are feeling and what parts of the body do they originate in. Thanks. Jim
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To clarify in case you mis interpreted, it's pull yourself PAST the paddle not TO the paddle. This makes you use your torso for the power rather than arms\shoulders.
Nope. There might be a paddle coach somewhere that would say that, but not many.
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agree--no past the paddle--then the toilet flushes behind you
funny---the time i most feel the "pull to the paddle" sensation is when board is just starting to catch the wave and get on plane--the resistance reduces and the paddle slips less---feels great
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I always have to remind myself to drop my lower hand. If it's too high it throws it all off. Lowering your hand helps get the blade in deeper and forces better position of your hips. That was the biggest thing I took away from Dave's coaching. Instantly more power in my stroke.
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I am a little confused as there seems to be the thought and the act of driving the hips forward and the bending from the waist and twisting to engage the core. Are there two different paths or is my lefty dyslexic brain creating cognitive dissonance once again.
Look forward to replies. Love the zone for this sort of dialogue..
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Nope, it's just a tricky dance. Reach out to that stop sign. Stack your shoulders. Now begin to untwist your upper torso and as it untwists, shove your hips forward. You just engaged a couple more big muscles in shoving you into that stop sign. You can also get a little thrust into your feet from the hip movement. Magic for unweighting a bit and shoving a board into a swell. I manage to do it all about once out of ten strokes, but when it comes together it's cool. You see a guy like Dave doing it and it's like clockwork. Blame Anabelle Anderson. It's all her fault.
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I am a little confused as there seems to be the thought and the act of driving the hips forward and the bending from the waist and twisting to engage the core.
The hips actually move back during the reach to support the bend/lean forward and then come forward during the stroke. Put your heels against a wall and try touching your toes to get a full visual of why they have to move like that.
While clearly still a power source, the upper body rotation to me is more about increasing reach.
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Lotsa interesting thoughts.. thanks for the input. This gets closer to what I was thinking of... PB: "Now begin to untwist your upper torso and as it untwists, shove your hips forward."
Standing in my office.. when I plant the paddle on the RH side of my imaginary SUP ..and torque up a strong twist, it's my left hip, it naturally comes forward - not both.
Jim
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One tip Dave K gave me was to finish with the lower hand touching my hip. This was to fix a problem I was having and was not for everyone. This makes me engage the hips on the stroke and helps a lot. May or may not help you, but you should try it and see.
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Larry Cain's tip to engaging the hips is to "imagine you're trying to F- the paddle."
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Lotsa interesting thoughts.. thanks for the input. This gets closer to what I was thinking of... PB: "Now begin to untwist your upper torso and as it untwists, shove your hips forward."
Standing in my office.. when I plant the paddle on the RH side of my imaginary SUP ..and torque up a strong twist, it's my left hip, it naturally comes forward - not both.
Jim
Yea, and the trick is to make it both. That's what Dave is teaching now, and it's useful. Larry Cain should be called the king of hips. Well, him and Annabelle, though I guess she'd be queen. When she thrust with her torso and hips the board almost comes out of the water.
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Is that her at about 1:30..?
https://vimeo.com/70843068
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Yup, but she's just chillin'. Unfortunately there don't seem to be videos of her new stroke. Remarkable that she took a winning stroke and tossed it in favor of something technically better--very Tiger Woods of her. She used to toss herself on the paddle at the catch. Now she sets the blade, gets a huge torso twist and hip thrust. If the guys weren't switching over to the same thing she'd be kicking their asses. Of course she does anyway, at least in a lot of cases. Candace has changed her stroke too, though not as radically. Fiona Wylde always had it, but she's emphasizing hip movement a little more. Not surprising that women are starting to lead the way in stroke development. They don't have upper body strength to toss away.
Here's Fiona at Turtle Bay when she beat Annabelle in the upwind section. Hips give you power in upwind:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuS55CojlFE&feature=youtu.be&t=129
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JP Slate 7'6" slug paddle training device. Check. 20 knot NE headwind. Check. HR monitor. CHECK!
All the responses plus reviewing the Larry Cain vids helped enormously. The personal place of confusion for me was bending from the waist and moving my hips forward. Catch 22..
By George I sorta kinda figured it out with all of the help. The new lower hand, bent elbow, bend reach and twist, push from HEELS, and pull that paddle, eh by not using my arms. Needs work but it's a start. Am a kinesthetic learner so once I felt it - mo bettah! HR ave 135 peak 156 no shocks and a happy cardiologist.
The poor woman did not understand peak 178 HR in long period hurricane swells!!
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Not to confuse this too much, but my friends who study biomechanics would yell at me otherwise.
While Larry says bend at the waist, he doesn't really mean that, and certainly doesn't do that. The hinge is at the hips/pelvis. Bending at the waist is done by flexing the lumbar spine rather than correctly tilting the pelvis. It's a subtle difference but is all important to the health of your lower back. Google will get you good examples of good and bad form.
Gray Cook is a guy worth listening to if you ever have a chance. He explains well how alternating parts of the body are made for either stability or mobility, and how disfunction in a mobility joint causes us to compensate by flexing an area meant to be stable. Tight hips, need to bend over, flex the lumbar spine - as an example.
http://graycookmovement.com/?p=118
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Digger71, Great stuff. I studied Hellerwork with Joseph Heller ( a Rolfing variant ) and Structural Analysis so you are absolutely correct regarding where you might choose to bend from.
That history was part of my confusion as what I been taught a very long time ago seemed to be at odds with what some paddlers were espousing!!
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Interestingly, I tend to hinge at the pelvis if my knees are somewhat bent vs a Japanese bow if knees locked. Seems obvious, but this sclerotic brain had to feel it... Back to shorter paddles.
Jim
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One more perspective that is key for me in all sports involving flexion; for me it always works best if I think of it starting at the ankles, and everything above that flexes in response. When we talk about flexing at the hips in a paddle stroke or any athletic movement, I like to make sure that the ankles flex just as much, so that the angle forward of my tibias and my spine are always roughly equal. When I think about getting the paddle blade deep enough at the start of the stroke, I start the flexing down movement from the ankles, and then the knees and hips flex in response. Flexing primarily from the hips puts us off balance forwards and stresses the back muscles to stabilize. Flexing primarily from the knees puts our hips too far back behind our feet, and can cause knee problems. To use examples from other sports: Focusing on bending the knees is one of the greatest problems for skiers since it puts them in the back seat. The key is to flex the ankles which drives the tibia forward into the front of the boot thereby driving the skis. The knees and hips just flex in response to this in order to maintain centered balance. What confuses people is that when you flex the ankles they see the knees move at the end of the tibia lever arm, so there eye is distracted by the knee movement, instead of seeing where the movement really came from in the ankles. When you flex just the knees, you see the hips drop back and down shifting the weight onto the heels. The same is true of the ready position in all action movement sports like tennis. Weekend warriors tend to stand with their ankles straight and bent over from the hips and waist. Pros stand with deeply flexed ankles and balanced flexion above that, which puts them in a better position to spring off.
Today I really enjoyed playing with the image of bringing the hips forward to meet the paddle during the stroke; thanks for that great tip. Once again, the key for me in this was unloading the flexion in the ankles so that the hips could unload forward.
Just a different perspective that I have found to be key for me in performance and teaching in all my sports.
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^ Great stuff nalu, I'll be thinking about that tomorrow morning.
One of my favorite sayings is 'When you get your hips into it, that's when the magic happens.'