Kayaking



This was photo was taken when I took the surf ski out to prepare for an adventure race. I kayaked along the bay alongside my friend who was training for the swim leg of the race.

 



It's Sunday morning and everyone has arrived. White training singlets and red shorts are de rigueur. Sunblock has been slapped on, and running shoes put onto feet.

Without further ado, the storage room door is unlocked, and either singly or in pairs, kayaks and paddles are shouldered and carried that short distance to the beachfront, placed there in preparation for training later.

The team captain calls out, and we break out into a warm-up run. A calisthenic and stretching routine follows after.

There is a slight nervousness in the air. The Year 1s were being introduced to new craft* today. Being fairly green and new to all this, we weren't really sure what we were getting ourselves into. The Year 2s seemed a lot calmer, being older hands at this.

The coach commands us to gather around, and reading out a name list, he assigns each of us into a craft. Next, he tells us the training distance and programme for today.

We soon head down to the water and the day begins for real.

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I can honestly say that my time on the kayaking team was a really memorable 2 years of my life. It wasn't just that the coach was bigger than life (though that was a big part of it), but the rigorous training really helped the team to bond together - it was a shared experience that you will remember for life. Not that I was a particularly outgoing member of the team - I was still quiet as a mouse then.

I started out as an incidental member of the team - I happened to sign-up for a try-out session doing an Open House of all the activities available at my high school - and it all went from there.

With time, I learnt the balance required (especially in 'K' crafts), and came to respect the training required to excel in this sport. Since then, I've tried out other forms of kayaking - practicing eskimo rolling in a canoe polo craft, low grade whitewater kayaking, ocean adventure racing in a surf ski - but nothing has matched the above experience so far.

To this day, I respect the man that my coach was and his philosophy in life. Also, the strong characters among my teammates - not necessarily the loud boisterous ones, but the quiet ones that were able to lead from the strength of their character.

In closing, there is nothing quite like the nervous energy of the pre-race paddle to the starting line. After all that preparation, after all that hard work at training. The feeling of shouldering your kayak, stepping into the water and climbing into your craft, placing your first stroke into the water and starting your paddle out, feet at the rudder to make minute direction corrections. You try to relax your back, your core, your arms - and let your body do what it knows how to do, while your heart is hammering out a nervous little beat. The waves are small but you feel their energy beneath the hull. You reach the start and you maintain your position, using the flat of your paddle to slap the water at times to maintain horizontal equilibrium, awaiting the sound of the air horn...

The horn goes off.

The race is on!

*T1, T2, K1, K2 - these were the racing kayak craft that were available to school teams in Singapore when I was in high school. Since then C1, C2 and K4 have been added to the repertoire. The alphanumeric code is as such: the letter refers to the class of kayak, and the numeral refers to the number of kayakers that can be carried.