Whitewater Freestyle Comps

Setting up the Gauley Fest

2006-09-21T17:36:00.000-07:00

First off, I want to say "Happy Birthday" to my Dad. Hope you're having a good day.

We camped last night at the fairgrounds where the Gauley Festival is going to be held. We helped out quite a bit yesterday, getting some lights set up and building a projection screen for a video premier on Friday. It got cold sometime between the time we got here and yesterday, with the temperature peaking at 63 degrees farenheit yesterday afternoon. So by the time we called it quits setting up the festival, it was time to drive into town for some much needed long johns for me, and a stocking cap for Matt. That made the night much more comfortable.
We headed back to the campgrounds with our new cool weather clothing, and started to set up camp, when we were joined by Ryan and Winston from Michigan, in town for the festival. It seemed that they had forgotten their tent back in Michigan. We loaned them ours, and slept in the Jeep again. It seems that the tent wasn't all they forgot. They both left their climbing gear at home, and they also asked me if I knew where to find any grass. I'm pretty sure there might have been a connection there...
When we woke up, we were surrounded on the campgrounds by a heavy coating of fog, and six other vehicles, full of boaters in town for the festival. We were somewhat worried that everyone would decide to camp where they were, but soon realized everyone was just crashing after driving in last night, and moved on to their own, more secluded campsites once the sun came up.
So we were left with a primo campsite, with our own bench and picnic table. Plus, we roped off our area to (hopefully) keep it to ourselves and our guests. And, as we later found out, we have a camping neighbor who is a "veteran" Gauley Fest camper. Ben, the American Whitewater organizer, says he's quite the party animal. We'll see how that turns out.
We had some work to do as volunteers, so we could earn our keep. First order of business was to fix the outdoor lighting that was put up yesterday. They had erected tall 2X4s with holes drilled in them, and rope strung through the holes. Then they attached lights and the wires needed to supply the lights with electricity. Well, over night, one of the ropes snapped (it was several years old) and had to be replaced. In the process, we ended up with several broken ropes and a toppled pole. We finally got everything in place. After finishing up a few odds n' ends for the AW staff, Matt and another festival volunteer Brad went boating on the lower Gauley. Brad's boat was in another town, so we loaned him the Rocker and some of our equipment. He was able to find a spray skirt and some other gear from other boaters in the area. It still amazes me how friendly the boating community is. Always willing to help out, even strangers.
I'm writing this as we head back from the takeout. We're going to try and find some broadband and upload trip pix and a few pictures of how the festival grounds looked this morning. I'm sure everyone will enjoy contrasting them with the pictures we take of the festival in full swing.

Have a good one!

-al

New Photos Added

2006-09-20T07:10:00.000-07:00

Hanging out at The Cathedral again, for a quick breakfastof coffee and bagels.
Finally got to add a few of the photos to some of the previous posts. And a few for this one.
Enjoy them.

The Cathedral is a pretty popular place. We've run into a few familiar faces. Some of the new friends from Rock Island and other places. We've seen Stephen Wright, Ben Guska, Sam Sutton and the other kids from New Zealand and the Wilderness Tours, including Jan Spindler, the crazy Czech. Sneaky Jeremy Adkins and Bryan Kirk, and quite a few familiar faces we're not able put names to.

Have a good one!

-al

Fun with Locals

2006-09-19T19:24:00.000-07:00

"You see, me and his son, Little Butch, we played football together."

Matt and I overheard this little snippet of conversation at Charlie's Pub, in beautiful Fayetteville, WV tonight, as we played pool and enjoyed some New River Pale Ale.
I've had a few requests to describe our surroundings in a little more detail, and I can't think of any better place to start describing than Fayetteville. This town is wonderful.
As you might remember from the last post, we rolled into town yesterday evening. We had time to briefly check out one gear shop, then do a little laundry and car washing. We spent the night in the Wal-Mart parking lot (Cheap camping...) and when we woke up, it was time to visit the rest of the town.
Fayetteville is an old town, and would probably be a ghost town, if not for the New River. The advent of whitewater rafting tours has really helped this town stay alive. There are three paddling specific gear shops in town, and a fourth, all-around outdoors adventure shop. These gear shops have all of the latest gear, great maps, and friendly, knowledgeable employees. Everyone of them is a boater or rock climber (The other HUGE sport in town) or biker or backpacker or all of the above. They truely know what they are talking about.
We spent most of the early morning hanging out in the gear shops, running into some of the people we met at Rock Island, and looking for someone to help us run shuttle on a nice, easy stretch of the New. We didn't find anyone to run shuttle for us, but that turned out not to matter.
In our search for a shuttle driver, we were directed to "The Cathedral." I want to emphasise that we did not know what "The Cathedral" is, at the time. We were only told to "Drive down the road, through BOTH red lights (people in West Virginia call them 'Red Lights' as opposed to 'Stop Lights' in Missouri.) and then "You'll see the cars with the boats on 'em."
So we went through both 'Red Lights' and looked around for cars with boats on top of them. And sure enough, on our right, (300 feet from where the man who gave us the directions was standing) was a cathedral.
It turned out to be "The Cathedral," an old church turned into a wonderful little coffee shop/cafe. I had the special, an English Muffin topped with scrambled eggs, ham and swiss cheese, which was really, really tasty, and Matt had coffee, and lots of it. We took advantage of their free WiFi, which quite a few of the other patrons, almost all of which were raft guides or fellow boaters, seemed to be enjoying.
It was really neat to see such a huge community of boaters in one place. It seems that the rafting week runs Thursday through Monday, and raft guides get Tuesday and Wednesday off. So The Cathedral is packed on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings, as all of the guides stagger in for a little coffee, some delicious breakfast and to decide where to go boating or rock climbing or mountain biking on their day(s) off. And The Cathedral is the place to do it.
We ran into a few of the Junior Men's competitors from Rock Island, and chatted with them for awhile. It turns out that Sam from New Zealand has apparently had a conversation with God Almighty Himself, wherin they discussed the exact date and time that Sam is going to die. And that is apparently not anytime soon. Or at least that's the way that Sam likes to boat. One of the locals was having fun listening to Sam's views on what he wants to run and why.
We also ran into Jeremy Adkins, a pretty cool guy who ended up placing in the top fifteen at both Rock Island and The Black River. He was feeling a little bit under the weather, a condition that mysteriously re-surfaced after the "Friends in Low Places" Party at the Jackson Factory Saturday night... Wonder what caused that... We chatted with Jeremy about the World Cup experience, and life in general, then he dissapeared. That Jeremy Adkins is sneaky.
After breakfast we decided that we weren't going to be able to find anyone to shuttle us, so we drove back down to the bottom of the New River Gorge, right under the massive bridge, and Matt started Kayak School. I got quite a bit of good practice in, making a vast improvement on my roll, and all of my paddling in general. It was pretty inspiring to look up at that huge bridge while working on my kayaking skills.
We finished up with the afternoon boating, and tried to find the Gauley Festival. It's not where you'd think it would be. (Note to Gauley Fest/Whitewater organizers: Put up some slightly easier to understand directions on the website. Probably wouldn't hurt...)
So we never found the festival grounds, but Matt did take a nearly vertical, 500 foot hike down to see the Pillow Rock Rapid on the Gauley. When he emerged from his return trip, I expected to see an equally worn out bear pursuing him, based on the look on his face. No bears, no emergency calls to the Ranger Station, we headed back into Faytetteville.
Dinner was at a nice little place called Pies and Pints. It sounded like my kind of joint from the get go. And we showed up on Tuesday night, which features their all-you-can-eat pizza buffet. Now, many pizza joints have an all-you-can-eat buffet, I even worked at one for nearly three years. But none of them do it like Pies and Pints. I've never had pizza like the pies I had tonight. The closest to a traditional pizza I had all night was the pepperoni, red pepper, tomato sauce, no cheese pizza. My (least expected) favorite was the gorganzola, grape, rosemary, pineapple. No joke. It was good. I also enjoyed the grilled chicken, pesto, feta cheese pizza. I've been hesitant to frequent pizza buffets lately, but I was glad to try all of these new, unexpected, pizza styles. I might just have to steal a recipie or two for myself.
After Pies and Pints, it was off to Rivermen Outfitters' Shad's Lounge (on a recomendation from a local.) The local might have been on busier nights. However, if you are ever in Fayetteville, and a huge Hank Williams Sr. memorabillia fan, then by all means, head over to Shad's.
From Shad's we headed to Charlie's Pub, where we played a little pool, chatted with the locals, and met the guy who played football with Little Butch. He also was in the Marine Corps with John Stevens, from Missouri. He wanted to know if we knew him.

Ok, it's late, I've typed more than I have for the last three days.
I want to leave with a request/appeal. If you are reading this, we'd love to hear from you.
Leave us a comment on the blog, or send us some email at ontheroad@whitewaterplayboating.com
or both.

Have a good one!

-al

Laundry Time Blues

2006-09-18T17:54:00.000-07:00

Ok, we left Rock Island this morning, and drove prety much straight to Fayetteville, West Virginia. The drive went nicely.
We checked out a local gear shop in the cool paddling town, then drove out to see the New River Gorge and Bridge. I've seen footage of the bridge on tv several times, but to see it in person was amazing. It's HUGE.

We drove down to bottom, a narrow, hairpin-turning stretch of road, decending the 900 or so vertical feet to the New River below.
A quick hike along the rock strewn bank for a photo op, and we were back in the Jeep on the way back out of the gorge.
Then it was wash time. First, the Jeep, then the laundry. I'm not sure which we needed to do more urgently, but I do know that I'm glad we got both done today. Matt cooked dinner on the hood of the Jeep in the Rite-Aid parking lot, while I tended to the wash. A few people stopped to ask what we were cooking, and to ask us about boating. Good times.

So here I sit, working on the laptop, waiting for the undies to dry so we can get on the road to find a place to camp.
I'll try and get the pics uploaded when we find a beefier internet connection.

Have a good one!

-al

Finals!

2006-09-17T16:59:00.000-07:00

Wow.
I thought yesterday was exciting!
In three of the four finals, fifth, fourth and third were all decided before the second and first place riders took their final rides. That meant each time it was up to the second place rider to throw down a huge ride and make up the point difference. Unfortunately, each time the first place rider was justtoo far out of reach.
Here's the champions:
Junior Men: Nick Troutman
Women: Tanya Faux
Men's Pro: Clay Wright

Highlight of the day: Clay Wright throws down a Competition-high 122 point first ride in the Men's Finals. He flushes out in the second ride, and by the time he's due up again for the third and final ride, he's guaranteed gold!
what do you do when you've already won the gold? Show the crowd you can win without your paddle!

Congrats to everyone in the finals.

Crazy Saturday

2006-09-17T10:41:00.000-07:00

Wow! What a day.
Today started off with the Jackson Kayak Demo on the Sandbar, just down river of the competition hole. I got to try out a Super Fun, which was a little large for me. Adam, one of the factory guys helped me out with my roll. Thanks man.

After that it was into town for a quick bite at the Rock Island Market, which provided me with a delicious, reasonably priced meal. We took our sandwiches on the road and headed down to the competition. We were in for a good surprise.
We had to park about a half a mile away from the hole and walk down to the access area where several companies had put up tents to sell / promote their gear.
We saw Gaia and Chaco and Keen, among others. There was also a food stand setup by the White County EMS, and a beverage cart from a church local youth group. A quick hike down to the hole revealed that there were many, many more spectators than at the practice session on Friday. All told, I think there must have been over three hundred people watching Saturday's competition. And the great thing was that there were several who were not kayakers. Many of them had heard about the event, and just come on down to see what it was all about. I think everyone left really excited about the sport.

The competition was awesome. The women started things off with two heats of competitors. The last competitor in the women's competiton was ten year old Lauren Burgess, boating in her pink Fun 1. EJ got the crowd pumped to help her get in, and finally stay in the hole, which was big and mean and scary. She was able to stay in the hole for awhile, and everyone applauded her efforts. Emily Jackson placed first in the women's prelim, and will compete today in the finals. Stephen Wright is currently in first in the men's pro class going into today's final round. The chase is definately on!!!
Then the men took the stage. 43 competitors were narrowed down to 15 finalists. I was amazed at the transformation from practice to competition. They really brought it up a level. I'm expecting to see some really, really big tricks in today's finals. Check out the full list of results over at the Jackson site.
After the competition ended, it was off to the "Friends in Low Places" party at the Jackson Factory. Matt and I had secured jobs as bartenders for the night, and we helped hundreds of people, from 20 different countries, (21 if you count, as the announcers do, Alabama as a separate country.) unwind after one crazy day on the water. The highlight of the evening was an appearance by Elvis (Jackson employee Rick). Elvis thrilled the crowd, with a very impressive performance. No one was aware, however, of what went on behind the scenes. It's been awhile since Elvis last put on the jumpsuit, and some impromptu alterations were needed to let it out in places. Apparently Elvis gashed open his finger with a knife, while performing surgery on his too-tight jumpsuit. But, like all other performers, Elvis knew the show must go on. So he sang his set, and left the building... in Matt's Jeep. Matt is now a member of an elite group of people who can say they drove Elvis to the hospital, and of a smaller group who can say they drove him back alive. When it was all over, Elvis had recieved 10 stitches, and two standing ovations.
It was a crazy, exciting day. I'm actually looking forward to only having to check out the finals today.
We'll put up a few more pictures and some videos once we find a place with internet access. (They're few and far between in this area.)
Have a good one
-al

Friday Practice Session Video

2006-09-17T10:19:00.000-07:00

Got the video from Friday edited down.

We've had a little trouble with the audio, we think we've worked most of the kinks out, but you might need to bump up the volume on your speakers for this one.
Enjoy!

World Cup Finals are Underway

2006-09-15T18:57:00.000-07:00

September 15th, Rock Island, Tn.

After 9 hours on the road, we finally made it to Rock Island. We checked into a nice campsite, grabbed our cameras and headed down to the competition hole to catch some practce and the Junior Men's Prelims.
We caught over 3 hours of video, and saw some amazing rides.
The World Cup organizers only had a few hours of water to work with, but kept the practice moving along smothly, with five different practice groups, each with 45 minutes on the feature. Eric Jackosn showed off his local playspot, by reminding everyone why he's the reigning world champion freestyle kayaker. We also saw Stephen Wright going BIG with loops and McNasties.
After all five practice heats had their time on the feature, the Junior Men's preliminary competition took the spotlight. Fifteen young men competed for the five spots in Sunday's final. I continue to be amazed by the skill these guys put on display this afternoon, in front of a crowd of more than a hundred fellow boaters and spectators.
Local favorite Dane Jackson let everyone know early in his first run that this is his hole, by throwing down big, and not stopping until they kicked him out of the hole. Dane set the bar high, and Canadian Nick Troutman answered the challenge, throwing down one of the best rides I saw by anyone all day.

Enjoy the Video

2006-09-15T07:11:00.000-07:00

Just thought I'd write down a couple of thought's I had while driving this morning.
I had always taken for granted the beauty of the state of Missouri. I'm sure that everyone takes the beauty of their home for granted, seeing it every day. But this morning, at sunrise, as I drove through the Mark Twain National Forest, I looked out and saw the hills covered in early morning mist, treetops poking out through the fog. It was absolutely gorgeous. Sometimes you just need to see it for the first time again.

We've made it through two states now, we're just outside of Paducha, Kentucky. We stopped at our usual gas station, and topped off the jeep. Just a few more hours till Rock Island.

Have a good one!

-al

Only a few more hours

2006-09-14T12:29:00.000-07:00

It's almost time to leave, the excitement is unbearable.
Here's a few words before we hit the trail.

Remember to keep checking back for daily updates.

2006-09-13T01:18:00.000-07:00

Gauley Fest

2006-08-25T16:07:00.000-07:00

This is going to be out first trip out to Gauley fest, and I have to admit that I have no Idea what to expect. Any tips will be greatly appreciated. We will be heading up from The World Cup Finals in Rock Island so if anyone might need to hitch a ride let me know and I will See what we can do.

Kayaking Picts 2006

2006-08-25T14:29:00.000-07:00

Matt Playing with the tiger at Rockport Ark.

(In James's Boat)

Ryan enjoying a well deserved brew at Fibbark

Amanda making it look easy at Dimond Splitter

Josh tearing it up on the Ocoee

James and Matt Having a special Moment at Fibbark

I got a little creative with the company logo..

World Cup

2006-08-25T13:50:00.000-07:00

I hope everyone is as excited about the comp as we are!! While we won't be able to make it to Canada, and New York, we will definitely be at Rock Island Cheering on Team USA.

I can't wait to see how they make Rock Island into a venue for spectators, it is going to be packed. I hope that they have the time and resources to improve the access to the event.

One of the ways to do this would be to setup a live video feed to the upper areas so that even if you aren't in the mist you can still see all the action. While this is not a inexpensive solution it does have it's benefits in time saved.

Anyone else have any suggestions on how to make Freestyle Kayaking a more accessible spectator sport?

The whitewaterplayboating crew will be running around so if you see us make sure and say Hi!
Hopefully by that time we will have gotten all of the bugs worked out of the site and it will be launched (at last) We have some great pics and videos that we can't wait to show!!

If you would like to know more about the site or have some great pics that you would like to show off drop me a line at matt@whitewaterplayboating.com

Matt