Author Archive

It’s pretty much spring, which means the racing season is almost upon us, brilliant! But don’t get all excited yet, there’s still plenty of time for the long ‘end of winter’ training sessions. What better way of getting the miles in than racing The Waterside Series…? ‘There is no better way!’ I hear you shouting, and maybe your right. Particularly if your goals this year involve marathon racing, or even 1000m sprint. For the people racing the 125mile Devises to Westminster the series is an essential part of their preparation, not only for the physical training but to learn Read the rest of this entry »

What with canoeing being an outdoor activity, we tend to notice the gradual and slight changes in the weather around this time of year. We all know that sooner or later the cold and general lack of comfort will push us all to reconsider the benefits of training through the winter, or even being involved in canoeing at all! This is just one reason why it is so important to actually look forward to your winter preparation, to avoid that mid January ‘I hate this sport’ phase.


Most people won’t have stopped training after their season, on the other hand international athletes will have up to 6 weeks of no training at all, but whatever ‘rest’ you decide to take, make sure you actually take it. It’s very important to have a break from training once a year, to allow your body to ‘miss’ that mixed feeling of fatigue and extra energy, and in doing so you should find yourself craving exercise. It’s the pituitary gland releasing endorphins that has us hooked, this euphoric natural pain killer is released after prolonged exercise making us feel good, improving confidence in our heath, lifestyle and can actually feel like it gives us energy, improving daily productivity. However, don’t expect to heave heaps of energy from training 3-4 times a day, believe me when I say the exercise/productivity curve has a peak, and then a very sharp drop!


So, take a short break if you haven’t already, don’t compromise on your enjoyment, and look forward to making it through the whole winter training period consistently.

Here is a man who knows a thing or two about having confidence in his winter training…

Hey guys sorry it’s taken so long but here are the highlights from this years marathon season, following myself and my friends around the world to various events, including both marathon world cups 1 & 2, the Nelo Summer Challenge and finally the Marathon World Championships in Banyoles Spain… Thanks to everyone for a great season of racing, I am already looking forward to next year!

Marathon World Championships 2010 – event review

It’s not often I come away from an international event with no complaints, (I love to have a grumble about things!) usually there are problems with over crowded late running busses, or maybe the venue is not good for spectators and sometimes the venue just plain awful for paddling, and you think ‘what the hell are we doing here?!’ Banyoles had none of these problems this weekend, hosting the World Championships was no issue at all for these organizers.
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In my eyes, there is a basic list of a few essential controllable elements that need to be in place for athletes to perform at their best in international marathon competitions;

1. Fly out in plenty of time for race preparation with the least amount of stress to the athletes.

Who decided it was a good idea to fly out at 10pm with only 1 day before our Junior Athletes take part in the most important race of their lives (so far)? Someone, PLEASE take all decision making responsibilities away from them in the future.

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Race Pace are supporting one of (if not the) best UK Club Marathon Races of the year, find the event on Facebook HERE. Click attending, if you think your hard enough…

Last weekend the famous boat manufacture Nelo ran their annual Summer Challenge Surf Ski event in Villa Do Conde in North Portugal. For those readers who might not be familiar with Nelo, get your self out from under that rock, have a shower and listen up; Nelo make racing kayaks and canoes. Their boat designs, build quality and service (all as standard) is unrivalled in the Flat Water racing community and they now make Surf Skis too. With the majority of Olympic medals won in Nelo boats, they don’t do things by half measures, and when they announced their new range of Surf Skis people started to get excited. Read the rest of this entry »

Stickering up and trying out the new Nelo Ski, I had never been in a Ski before so this was going to be interesting! Turns out it’s much harder than it looks, you can’t just pull harder to go fast, you really do need to know what the waves are doing and make the best of them. In terms of effort, little and often seems to be the way the best guys paddle, to try and catch ‘runs’. To be honest, I think it would be easier if there was some wind and some bigger waves! But this has to be some of the most fun I’ve had in a kayak, I want to order one right now.

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Great Britain has a new world champion; Ed McKeever won the K1 200m World Championships today almost half a second (half a boat length) in front of the ’200m master’ and Multi Olympic Champion Ronald Rauhe (GER), Piotr Siemionowski (POL) took 3rd. McKeever has been dominating the 200m event all Read the rest of this entry »

Today saw some spectacular racing at the Malta lake in Poznan. For starters we had Rachel Cawthorn taking 4th place in the 1000m final, not the result that she would have liked, but she raced very well and should be proud considering the amount of racing she is doing this weekend. Rachel will be fighting it out in the A final of both the 500m K1 and K4 tomorrow, where I am certain she will pick up a medal or Read the rest of this entry »