Learning to roll

[Guest guest]

>

>...

>

>>>...low and high sculling for support on both sides.

>>> Sculling for support. The paddle to be kept low, nearly

>>> horizontal, with evidence of confident committal to the paddle.

>

>Does it make sense to say the paddle has to be low and

>nearly horizontal for a full wet-shoulders scull? If your

>outboard elbow is under water, the paddle could scarcely be

>anything but low. A too low (that is, diving) paddle is

>more likely the problem (and I speak from experience there)

Sounds like your paddle blade is too low, but your paddle shaft is not- if it is angled up away from the deck, the blade is dug deep. In this way, the language in the BCU notes is not clear in differentiating between the paddle shaft and the paddle blade. This was one of the harder things for me to learn, the paddle shaft is actually over my head to keep it as close to horizontal as I can get it, difficult position to get used to.

>

>Also, as I'm beginning to understand (thanks to Mike Crouse

>this very afternoon!) full sculling for support is more a

>matter of body and boat position, with very little paddle

>pressure needed. So does it make sense to speak of

>"confident committal to the paddle"?

Sure it does; if you are not committed to using the paddle for support more than just your body position , over you go(assuming that you are edged past the point of final stability and your body weight is off the midline of the boat) ie wet elbows at least. I believe the intent here is to make sure that folks are not simply relying on their hips to keep the boat rolled off them just enough to stave off the deadly capsize while "faking" the sculling brace.

In fact, that sounds

>more like a good committed lean with an ongoing scull to

>keep braced, as opposed to a quick slap and hip-snapped

>recovery.

This is important, because now we are back to the time issue. The sculling braces I have had to execute were over the course of 20 seconds minimum, a whole lot longer than a quick hip snapped recovery.

Also, the BCU speaks of both and high and low

>sculling, and it seems to me the only kind of wet-shoulders

>sculling possible is high.

This is true, the low sculling is essentially a "screener" to see if your skills are even in the ballpark for the truly committed sculling brace.

>

>Sorry for the intense textual exegesis of the 3-Star Gospel

>of BCU. But I may have convinced at least myself that those

>who interpret that passage as wet-shoulders sculling are

>stretching things.

Hmm- not sure I can help you here, David, sounds like a question for a Coach 4 or Assessor as far as the BCU orthodoxy goes. I do know that keeping your shoulders parallel to the boat is not acceptable to the folks I have trained with(2 BCU coach 3's and 1 BCU Coach 4), and that you do actually have to support your weight away from the midline of the boat ( by angling out at a perpendicular to the boat deck) with the scull. Of course, there is always going to be a certain amount of interpretation by BCU Coaches of exact content and intent, some folks are going to emphasize specific skills more than others. AAh, but we live in an imperfect world...

Actually, it may be even more than that.

>Arey the taking one technique -- sculling with significant

>paddle support -- and substituting a rather different one --

>wet-shoulders sculling along the lines of a balance brace

>with light sculling?

This boils down to which "they" you are referring to- the BCU as an entity, or specific coaches, or folks who have trained and/or certified at various star levels...

Alex L

[Guest guest]

Here's another paddle float tip I just learned (thanks, Sean) -- you can ditch the paddle, and inflate the paddle float and lean over onto it like a pillow to practice your hip snap, trying to leave your head on the pillow as much as possible. Gradually deflating the air helps ensure you aren't pushing off of it with your arms.

I also leaned how hard rolling practice is when you're really tired. yeesh.

--b

[Guest guest]

I'm glad it helped, I got the tip from Senor Crouse...once again another example of the 'pass what you've learned' --- thank YOU Mr. Crouse....

[glenn]

Those of you who haven't joined us in Chinatown are missing the really excellent spectacle of Bethany almost managing a hand-roll with a whole lot of entertaining splashing in the setup.

I can also heartily endorse Sean N.'s suggestion of starting with a sweep roll. After a couple weeks of blowing C-to-C rolls, I was set for an evening of slow paddle-float deflation in the hopes of getting the paddle motion into my muscle memory. Sean was clearly being absurd when he told me to take the float off and just continue the paddle sweep all the way back. You could tell from his knowing smile.

I was still thinking about how to get him back when I found myself upright again.

[stnoonan]

Glenn,

You did great. I'm glad you were open to trying a different roll and were rewarded by nailing it multiple times. Bethany too was amazing, and she will have that hand roll before very long.

Besides these tricks, there were multiple first-time offside rolls, twig rolls, and a relative newbie that Sing almost had rolling, too. Congrats pool rats! We all had a good night.

[Guest guest]

If I ever test for BCU, I'll test in Fla. I'll certainly avail myself of the excellent instruction in Maine however.

With any certifications system there is absolutely an incentive to keep people out of the higher echelons. They cam become coaches and compete with theis seniors.

No way is a full scull described in the level 3 test the way I read it. I've heard other ridiculous stories about some folks BCU lever 3 tests.

Watching me today there would be no doubt I was fully committed to the paddle, and no way was my ear in the water. I can do that right side on a good day, but not left yet.

[Guest guest]

Peter-

Getting your whole body (w/e/o waist down) in the water while sculling is more than possible. It's more body positioning (and more appropriately flexibility) to get into that position.

When I scull both my shoulders are in the water, my face looking directly straight into the sky, my body is 90 degrees from the boat, and my blade (power face down) 1" beneath the surface, and is 'skulled' between 45 and 60 degrees from the boat.

As for getting my ears wet, I guess I could either tip my head back and submerge my head, or turn to the side.

I think it's more committing your body than your paddle -- it's amazing how much floatation your pfd will give you in that position -- try it in a ww boat - you may not even need your paddle...

[cmfos]

This is a very interesting discussion. My experience was similar in that I learned roll first and only recently learned how to scull for support on the surface of the water. For me at least, sculling was more difficult because of my inability to smoothly transition from a vertical position to a horizontal one (i.e. parallel to the surface of the water). I'd slowly start lowering myself down to the water and then, whoops! down I'd go. Frankly, my sculling is still like this although I have found a position where my boats are exceptionally stable and I can rest my body on the surface of the water with minimal sculling or support from my paddle. If I were sculling on my right side, then I would be pushing up with my right leg and tilting my head and body back towards my back deck. In this position, I am quite stable on the surface of the water and I can scull indefinitely. I do not know if this would meet BCU standards however since i am not relying principally on my sculling paddle blade for support: most of my stability is coming from my body and boat position. Now if I were to stop sculling, I would most likely plunge in but the fact that it takes such little effort to support myself with the paddle makes me wonder if this is acceptable BCU technique. What do the message board folks think?

Jim

[Guest guest]

Hmm, it seemed the point of what folk were teaching me in the pool last Saturday about sculling was that it really Didn't take much support from your paddle, so maybe you've got it exactly right, Jim.

I think the hardest thing about learning to scull the other night (thank you Jill!) for me was that I kept trying to lift my head to hear instructions, lol. I also learned that the image-oriented instructions were definitely as helpful for me as hearing "this knee here, this blade there" -- also hearing "pretend you are seaweed" made me understand the kind of mellow, slow motion as well.

I do think having learned to roll first made me less worried about going over, and more confident. But, though I had pretty good balance, I couldn't tell -- I really couldn't feel when I was holding myself there vs. when I had help at all.

--b

[mesbennett]

Hello ALL,

First I want to thank you all for this great thread!. I have been working on my roll for the past year..this winter alone in a pool where I live here in middle New Hampshire..kinda picking my way by feel so to speak.

I am very interested in the scull discussion. There seems to be identification of two seperate skills...

1 - "If you can scull well enough to bring your head up for air, there is no nead for a spotter".

and

2 - support skulling with shoulder (maybe two) in the water.

So one appears to be "recovery" and the other "preventative".

Am I correct in this assessment??

If so, could some one give me some pointers in the "recovery" scull that allows the ability to relax, get some air, avoid panic, (and all the other stuff I experience when I am working on the third grab for air when the roll, on or off side, is not working exactly as planned!!!

gotta love this group..."pass it on" what a great slogan and even greater..the fact that so many agree with it AND practice it!.

Thanks

maryb New Hampshire

oh if there others of you who might be near me(grantham, NH) I would love to have compadries who want to get that combat roll!!!

oops! another oh! thanks for the info on the star tests and requirements

[Brian Nystrom]

Mary, these are largely the same thing. Your best bet might be to attend the upcoming Greenland day at the Reading Y. You'll see plenty of sculling demonstrated there.

[markstephens]

I tried this the other night. I just sunk. Paddle-float and all. Us high-density, large-boned types have a real cross to bear in this sport. *sigh* When I learned to swim, I could never float on my back, even without a kayak attached to my hips. My body just plain doesn't float.

Anybody got any land-based exercises for developing a really strong hip-snap?