Faster pussycat

Malcolm with the afterburners on

Malcolm is a speed demon; he's said as much. He tries to get every ounce of speed out of his paddle. Its a question I've mulled over in my mind ... what is the upper boundary of speed in a seakayak?

Singles Olympic kayak racers compete in two events, the K1 500 and 1,000 metres. They paddle, on average, 18.5 kms/hr (10.25 knots) in the 500 and 16 (8.75) in the 1,000. That's on a silky smooth course in ultra sleek racing yaks. Those speeds can't be maintained over longer, day-paddle distances.

We don't paddle racing boats and we're not Olympic caliber athletes (if we were we'd be there competing wouldn't we?). What can we hope for?

It depends on a lot of things. Sea state, wind and paddle direction and penchant for speed. It seems to me that I can paddle downwind in a following sea twice as fast as into the same conditions. Paddling downwind its possible to let it all hang out. Upwind requires pacing oneself. Paddling too hard upwind runs the risk of running out of gas before reaching the destination.

Its nice to have a measure of paddling speed because it gives an indication of progress in developing an efficient paddle style. Ultimately, it comes down to efficiency. Efficiency provides the greatest speed possible in any given condition on the water because we can't always wait for calm conditions like Olympic racers do.