The Slough Slog

November 30th, downtown Woodinville WA of all places to find a kayak race. The good folks at Paddler Magazine got together and decided to put on a 'tune-up' race for next weekends Deception Pass Dash. Twenty six paddlers showed up for this impromptu race. There were sea boats, whitewater boats, creek boats and a couple of other designs I didn't recognize. With the boats in the Sammamish River promptly at 10:00 AM the whitewater boats took off down river, followed 5 minutes latter by all but the sea boats who left last 10 minutes after the first wave of boats. Racing 1 1/4 miles down river, turn around a buoy and return. Simple !! There was one problem, you had to navigate thru the rapids and very strong current of Little Bear Creek. Since the river is shallow here I made the most of my neoprene covered knuckles and walked my boat following three failed attempts to paddle up stream in the strong current. Heck we even had a few swimmers, much to the delight of the many bickers who stopped to watch ( laugh)..
Results:1. Tom Wier, C1 Wildwater: 28:592. Rich Romer, K1 Wildwater: 30:033. Jennie Goldberg, K1 Wildwater: 31:194. Tao Berman, sea kayak (Eddyline Falcon): 31:335. Rufus Knapp, K1 Wildwater: 33:206. Christian Knight, Long boat, Green Boat: 33:357. Greg Barden, sea kayak (wood): 34:178. Darren Albright, Long boat (Response): 34:409. JP, sea kayak (Tempest 170), 34:50 *corrected10. Rob McKibbin, 9 and under (Nomad) 35:0811. Philip Sparr, sea kayak (Vokhv): 35:5712. Joe Jackson, 9 and under (Remix): 36:0513. Josh Knight, sea kayak (Necky Looksha): 36:2214. Dave Hablewitz, longboat (Hydra): 36:3215. Mike Kord, 9 and under (Dagger RPM): 36:3616. Ben Hawthorne, long boat (Crossfire): 37:5417. Chris Rogers, sea kayak (Wilderness Systems 170): 38:2618. Joel Martin, long boat (slalom): 44:43 (swam)19. Bernie Swanson, sea kayak (Nordkapp): 46:3320. Scott Waidelich, 9 and under (Jackson): 46:39 (late for race)21. Cathy Haggerty, sea kayak (Valley): 46:4122. Bill Porter, sea kayak (Romney): 46:5023. Henry Romer, sea kayak (Acadia?): 48:0824. Steve Murphy, sea kayak (NA): 50:5125. Mark Baron, sea kayak (P&H Quest): 52:4026. Bill Walker, sea kayak (P&H Capella): 53:19