Tai Chi in the Snow - A Week in the Swedish Wilderness

Every few months we get an email from OAS, the Outdoor Academy of Scandinavia, they are eagerly received by the shop staff keen on some training in the wilds of Sweden or Norway. This March was my turn for a trip away in the snow. After hunting  out what information I could on what boots were suitable for snow shoeing and what I could get from our suppliers at the end of a cold winter season I ended up with a pair of I ended up with a pair of Hi-Tec Winter Boots and some Rab Down Booties for in the sleeping bag in the cold northern nights.

Kit list complete I booked my two flights to Ostersund, north of Stockholm with an overnight stop at the superb Jumbohostel at Stockholm Arlanda Airport.

Next morning began the usual game of spot the people who are catching the same flight as you who are on the same trip. A multi national bunch from all over Europe with oversized bags and big warm boots stood out from the other passengers. Arriving at Ostersund airport (the only airport I know of with a small Tentipi inside and giant one outside), we were loaded into the waiting coach for our journey to the mountains. 


Kit issue is always well organised at these events, find your rucksack with your name on it, check everything fits and swap what you aren't happy with. With some persistence I managed to get a pulka to myself, well I asked if there was one, it seemed a better idea to have my kit on a sledge rather than on my back.


Next came a whirlwing of training, clothing and sleeping bags from Haglofs and Klattermusen, tents from Hilleberg, underwear from Woolpower and stoves from Primus.


Next day we were off into the wilds, pitching our tents and boiling up snow for drinks and food, all set up in snow deeper than our thighs we had a talk from the nature reserve warden about the park and how to work in harmony with the environment and wild life.

 

 

We were split into groups of ten or so, then into tent pairs, changing tents each night. The  first job on camp was always to get the cook tent up, dig out the floor and get a brew on. Each day a different tent pair was give the leadership role, in charge of the group and navigation for the day, a task I managed to avoid until the last day.

The first team decided to ignore the ski trails and take a short cut towards the days destination, the picture shows how much climb you can find between 10m contours, and you can't always get back down where you think it might be possible from the map. Virgin snow in snow shoes and big packs wasn't everyone's idea of fun.

Last team to the camp site, we where soon set up and cooking, with petrol stoves, reliable and quick to melt the snow.

Next day was a training day, with tent pitching races, clothing quizzes, navigation exercises and more, great fun with scores kept for the end of week prize giving. doing a team impression of the fibres in woolpower underwear was a highlight, if only I hadn't lost the photos.

After a good nights sleep came the highlight of the trip, I have always wanted to dig and sleep in a snow cave, and this was the day. If you have dug a snow cave you will know that you want a steep slope of reasonably compact snow. If you are building a dozen snowholes and get the last spot where the slope is getting too gentle, you know the work is harder. In a steep slope you dig your snow out and throw it out the door and it falls down the slope, we dug it out, threw it once, then threw it again before it went down the slope. A four man hole takes a long time to dig, but we got there in the end, though we didn't add the loo one of the teams dug.

That was our warmest night by far, snug and quiet in the snow after six hours of hard digging. When we awoke we dug ourselves out to a gorgeous sunny morning, all the snow caves had disappeared in to the slope with the drifting snow, a couple were dug out from six foot drifts.

After a good hot breakfast of muesli with chocolate chips, we headed off into some good foggy mountain weather, a big climb with packs  and pulkas we pulled together as a team, down in to the valley and we passed a state complex of huts, and even a little shop, staffed all winter and placed at the junction of mountain valleys, up hill again, and back in to the weather to our last mountain camp site. After passing several ice falls, and with the dark creeping in we set up camp in the woods.

A down hill day, most of the way back out of the wilderness. Pulks pushing us gently down the track, fox tracks on frozen lakes and a short day to a great camp site with room for all our tents below a great little hill. A tempting little hill, so up we stomped in the snow first for the views and second for the night glow one of the team organised, every tent glowing with torch light in the dark.

The last day dawned, an with it our turn to lead. Not wanting to do the day job, I offered to navigate and let my tent partner lead. Then we got our task, a day of navigation, their aim to get us walking through trackless winter forest. Our first leg took us to a frozen lake, and our second to a clearing in the trees. Having given us our last objective, a ribbon lake 3k away they decided that instead of a nice easy approach with a catching feature and an attack point for the middle of the lake I had to take us straight there on a bearing. After an hour of fighting through the woodland, from tree to tree and taking back bearings on our track I stopped and pointed out the way to the lake. They wouldn't let me take the route I knew was the way to the lake, when they showed me the GPS I understood why, a perfectly straight line through 3k of woodlands, snow drifts, thickets and frozen lakes, past strange trees and animal tracks. All with an impromptu Tai Chi lesson to help the team keep their snow shoes on the top of the snow.

So after a hot lunch on a frozen lake we headed back, past the first liquid water we had seen for five days, down to the sports complex for well earned beer, hot tubs and rolling in the snow, and a grand Swedish banquet with quizzes, prizes and our Outdoor Ambassador of Scandinavia certificates. From the meeting at the airport to the slideshow of our escapades in the bar, the Woolpower factory tour and the very cheap, sightly soiled Scandinavian Outdoor kit we came home with, the Swedes have shown us once again that they really know how to to retailer training in the great outdoors.


With thanks to all my group, and the organisers of a fantastic week I hope you have as fond memories as do and are looking forward the next trip to Sweden.

A Taste of Stand Up Paddling on White Water

All set for after work with two boards on the car I rushed back from our Level 1 coach course and head for Mile End Mill with Ant, probably the UK's only white water Stand Up Paddling Expert, fresh from paddling Low Force Ant was going to introduce me to this new white water sport.

 For those of you who know Mile End Mill, we started on the nursery slope by the buildings, Ant teaching me to switch feet at the right moments. You carry your weight on the back foot and trim with the front foot, switching where you want to change edge. The boards respond well to edging and weight shifts.

We ran the middle stopper a couple of times then ran the bottom drop with Ant surfing the wave half way down in good style. After an hour or so on the water and several surf/swims in the bottom hole we headed back to the car park before I was too tired to carry the board. It's very physical and hard work on your core, but on the way back up I started driving with my legs, which will make it easier next time, yes there will be a next time I am sure.

But before that Ant will have me out in a pink Jackson Star, introducing me to freestyle in the modern sense. The last event I entered was a Hurley Rodeo, I got through to the second round with a reverse surf in a borrowed rotobat, some 20 years ago, so I think things may have changed.

To find out more about Stand Up Paddling and video of Ant landing Low Force visit Ant's Facebook page

Level 5 coach Development Day 6 

Back on the Dee with Elaine and Gerwen, Pete to coach first

Checked if wants had changed, Elaine happy with the theme of developing confidence, Gerwen wanting to learn more about reading water.

Would have been good to have asked how they felt today, tired, brain full etc.

On the top pool got them to warm up and think about what they did yesterday. Elaine was doing fine. Gerwen had lost all rotation from his forward paddling. Worked on keeping the top arm level, a clean slice out of the water and not bending the back arm. Still not working so came up with an Austin Powers fembot analogy, shooting enemies to either side with his nipple guns, 10 degrees to start then 20 degrees, this finally brought in rotation and he could feel it in his back. So we ended up with a short powerful stroke, I wanted to move on to the beachball between the arms to stop bending of the back arm. Spikes next step if that didn’t work would have been to get him to put his hands right out to the blades.

Now i had been neglecting Elaine, giving her some trim tasks on the jet, the tasks were not specific enough and the venue was rubbish. I could have dropped down below the bottom drop, got Elaine working on some decent water and still had flat water to work with Gerwen. I don’t think I finalised that session before I started working on the next theme. I ended up changing venue and task, breaking the flow.

Running the top drop got them to think about trim (which Elaine had been working on today, and Gerwen yesterday) this didn’t work and would have been better just having fun paddling down rather than shifting threads.

Next below the top drop I wanted to get them both paddling more efficiently. I asked Gerwen just to paddle across behind the big rock and back then asked him to use the river features to make it easier, that worked. With Elaine I asked her to paddle across and back without first defining efficiency, too loose a task, then I asked her to use the river features specifically the wave below the “hole ” on river left, the mid eddy and to ride the back of the small stopper over toward the big rock. I chose this approach because she dropped down a lot on the cross, but i think that, rather than lack of understanding this dropping down was down to the lack of confidence that Elaine was aiming to work against. When I specifically asked her to use the wave she still missed it due to timidity and not using the sweet spot but trying to use a run up which she then stalled.

Moving on we ran the middle drop, I again tried to get them to use trim to help with the drop and I wanted Elaine to stick with a planned route, which she had not done on the top drop. Again Elaine changed her mind, Gerwen ran it OK without sinking. Again I feel I gave Elaine two things to work on and wasn’t specific enough in my instructions.

On to the mini wave 30m below the bottom drop hole/wave.

Spike pulled me aside and got them to play on the wave and asked me a question of both of them

• What do they need to fix here
• How do they like their information

I correctly identified that they liked getting answers drip fed to them and they both needed to sort their position when getting on the wave. Both the same basically.

So i got permission to be more directive, and things started moving forward quickly. Gerwen was going in too fast and bouncing off the front wave, Elaine either being too timid and not getting on the wave or hitting it too high. At this point a demo would have been really good, I fell into the trap of playing with the newer toys of questioning and task setting when a demo would have spoken volumes to them, as would framing the task with the simple “We are going to work on surfing, using our position on the river to work with the river and make life easier”. Anyway, I made them stop the boat and find the sweetspot to get themselves easily on to the wave. I started using bandwidth feedback, discouraging the negatives and reinforcing the positives to improve their performance. I was missing some basic observational points, Elaine went back to taking a run up and was bouncing off the wave. Once Gerwen was getting on the wave consistently he was dropping off the back when he ruddered to turn, his rudders were out to the side and too far forward creating a lot of drag, I got him to move them back and parallel to the boat and voila, he stayed on the wave consistently. Once they both got consistent quality performances we broke for lunch. If it weren’t for lunch time interceding a change of venue t o the bottom wave would have been ideal for carrying on the thread. They also where consciously using trim on the wave, a great session with some good questioning from Spike to keep me on track while coaching students with a  high level of performance.

Things I missed? I didn’t box off subjects with summaries and clear reasons for moving on, nor did I frame each new thread with motivation for the students or give them my aims for each session. Early on in the session I didn’t fix variables enough, and when getting them to work things out, I wasn’t clear in what I wanted them to look for.

The afternoon – Dan runs a great session on boofing and trim

Warm up on the top pool, hop out to inspect the top drop, great preamble about what he was looking to get out of the session for them, then repeated running of the drop just to the right of the boof rock, adding in timing, angling the boat so it goes straight when you do the boof stroke, dry land drills on lifting the feet. Then a change of venue to the middle hole for some great performances keeping the front deck dry, even in a Pyranha Stretch.

Next question from Dan “would you like to head down river to somewhere you can put this in to practice in a bigger environment”, and off to town falls. 6 on the mile end mill guage, so after an inspection Dan got Spike to demo a line running from left to right to boof off the anvil. Elaine nailed it, running the rapid despite a previous bad experience hitting a rock at the bottom she overcame her nerves to give a great performance, Gerwen didn’t get enough speed across the current and ended up flipping in the pot but rolled well. All out at the Ponsonby car park.

Spike was happy to say little in the debrief, other than a great session at level five standard, the only thing he might have added would be making sure they where aware of short term trim (boofing) and long term trim (leaning back), awesome one Dan.

Gerwen on the Town Falls Approach in Llangollen

For me a great day, knowing where I am and where I am moving towards, lots of positives and lots of ways I know how to improve, big smiles.

Level 5 Coach Day 5

Guinea Pigs on the River Dee – Put in below the horseshoe weir

2 Students Elaine and Gerwen

Elaine old Level 2, WW 4* and sea kayaker, lost some confidence through no particular incident (perhaps shoulder). Has paddled upper Dart a few times and led the loop.

Gerwen Level 2, wants to do 4*, paddled 3 and 4’s and Aberglaslyn in low water. Wants general improvement.

Dan coaching first

Observing during warm up

Spike spotted (and we didn’t) Gerwen had an uneven grip, used tape inside one hand with twists in the tape so he moves his grip out when he touches the tape.

Spikes debrief suggestion was that the overly structured task of ferry gliding form point a to point b made it hard to tell as much as just saying cross the river as well as you can.

We dropped down to the rapid by the Chain Bridge and Dan developed a theme of driving the boat across the current, and for Elaine of putting a blade in the eddy on breaking out.

This theme was carried on down through the Serpents tail and lunch.

My observations of the paddling included.

Elaine bouncing when putting on power, Gerwen not very connected to the boat (A stretch, apparently a horrid boat to paddle). Both reliant on strokes rather than positioning or power. Gerwen sunk the boat on the bottom drop due to poor trim.

My plan was to work on trim on eddy line transitions then transfer that on to a re run of the tail.

I got them doing s turns below the tail then trying different trim on the transitions. Driving over the eddyline interfered with the trim, so we scrapped trim for a while and got them doing transitions without power over the line. This cut stroke numbers after a while. Then I got them to try trim variations on the eddy line, still not clicking. A quick word from spike, then I set the circuit with fixed angles and targets so the only variable was trim and we started moving forward. Before or after this I did a demo of trim on eddylines, back then forward and they started to get it.

Once they felt they were getting some where we went to run the bottom drop on the tail (6 on the JJ guage).  Elaine didn’t want to confuse things by thinking about trim in a nervous situation, so she elected to just run it, then she did try the trim and leant back a bit early, still successful. Both Gerwens runs were on wide lines, but both were better and dryer as he used good trim.

Key question from Elaine, now I can cross eddylines without paddling across the transition is it wrong to reach in to the eddy. No now you have two techniques.

Quick questioning conclusion, then running down to railway bridge playing eddies with trim changes on transitions to integrate the trim bunny hops on eddies.

Forward paddling on the flat. Good individualisation

Fell down on not knowing some technicalities, keeping top hand level with the eyes, finish with top hand over the knee, flick up the blade at the end of the stroke.

 Level 5 coach Development Day 4

Observing Pete Catterall coaching freestyle (ex GB freestyle coach) at Mile End Mill.

Wants and needs chat

Comparing what they do as warm up compared to what they say they want, then choose a coaching location, based partly on need and partly on student preference (they didn't want to work the middle hole). Looking for ratio of paddle to body/blade, wanting 10 to 90 seeing the opposite.

Looking for the same ration on wave surfing, flat with little edge, wave spinning in the bottom hole. Thinking about position first, then snap the body round. Too much edge relative to the green face causing blow offs, so working on reducing edge.

Using wooden model for demo's, and showing body action whilst on the bank.

Asking what percentage of the spin is on paddles and how much on torso rotation, then get them to work on reversing the ration. How do you want me to tell you this, I can give you the answer or you can work it out (caters to their preferred learning style).

Moving on - that wave was not rewarding you for doing it right due to surging so lets change venue. Getting them to the middle hole which is more predictable.

Briefing on the bank by the middle hole using a laminated sheet to sketch out the zones of the site and where we are working and using what. Back to positioning then working on the edge and body rotation.

Bandwidth feedback - giving feedback above a given level of performance and when they are below a certain level, leaving a band in which we don't give feedback.

Discussed limiting factors, such as psychology and injury.

A major highlight for me was when Pete pulled them off the wave and got them to turn the boats without paddles using body movement, edge and weight transfer, then to try and transfer that body english to the wave. This stood out as a key freestyle movement to initiate all the moves and emphasising the 90/10 body/boat to paddle ration Pete spoke of earlier.

Afternoon session

Being coached in river boats by Spike
Students me and matthias
Wants me, get to know my relatively new boat
Matthias to get back into kayaking after a long layoff.

Spike got us working on the rapid above the ramp on break ins and break outs, trim and for me, wing style forward paddling.

Top drop, a couple of runs on the boof move to the left thinking weighting and unweighting, then lifting feet on the boof. Down to the wave below the bottom wave, get on the wave, then restricting the task by cutting down paddle strokes. This tightened focus and forced me to solve the task differently, bringing in much more use of trim, esp. unweighting the front to get over the trickier bits, a good site for this. Advanced coaching in non advanced water. We then moved this to the top wave of the bottom drop to do a similar task in a different environment and to identify what tactics lead to success.
Then a play on the bottom wave for fun, trying to apply the principles coached to the others in the morning.

 Level 5 coach Development Day 3

Individualisation

Discussion about coaching the mind modules, worth doing or researching.

Motivation - to succeed, not to fail or to fail

Using covert/ overt observation, warm up is a great time to do covert observation, in a similar vein keep your camera on a tripod so it is not in your face when being videoed, it could be on or it might not.

Gaining time whilst coaching multiple students individually,
don't wait for latecomers, get jobs you can do done
"Go and have another go"
"This time think about....." Feel, intensity etc.
Come back when you...
Reciprocal, great when two students converge wanting attention, you tell each other what you have been working on and swap ideas etc.

Wants and needs are often different
Avoiding a demo can be tactic to avoid everyone working on the same thing, but demo's can be good, and they can be framed individually.
white lies? questionable but can motivate a flagging student on an ergo "When you did that Pete, the power reading jumped."

Adapting to preferred learning styles can be good, ask how do you want this, do want the answer or do you want to work it out.
video comparison, with initial performance, with mental image
Set tasks you don't need to remember.
Tasks can be open or closed.
Structure
Change pace or change location
choose your position wisely so they are ready for input when they get to you or must come out of their way to you.
You can block one student when you talk to another or when thinking.

Practical
A tutor coaching three of us in forward paddling in sea kayaks to evidence individualization techniques  (Spike, John Green), then on to the ergo with video, both live and recorded. Interesting playing with wing style technique on the ergo and the lake.

Practical pm
We split into 3 groups, and one from each group coached the others (3 in our case) to practice individualization techniques. I coached forward paddling, reverse paddling and edging on ferry glides.

Evening Session - The Assessment
Pass rate 42-45% Day pass rate 62%, only about a quarter go to assessment.
Costs 1500 per candidate but you only pay 650
The action plan and mentoring are key
You need a supporting narration from your tutor, a good thing to get them to do each time they see you.
Your Project
Knowledge dissemination that becomes a resource for coaches in paddlesport. It has a clear audeince and is based on reflective feedback or process. Can go in at any time, ideas can be looked at by the assessor.
Review Days
One day mock assessments you can bring long term students or fresh ones, cost around £100
Thought - work as a group with Rich and Ant to observe each other or even coach each other.
PyB also do development days on a similar basis.
The Assessment
North Wales in Fen, Scotland in April (Glencoe area)
the closing date is strictly 3 months before just to give time to book the assessment team.
Book on via Maria Winfield at BCU
Have a bad weather / bad conditions back up plan.
Can be useful if your students haven't been coached together before to avoid interfering behaviour patterns.
Get 5 or 6 long term students then taper. Keep student notes and know how they like to learn, work with long and short term goals, review each session for them and for you. Students should be at 4 * performance standard at assessment.

70% fail on individualisation, which is down to the coaching structure.

Day Two

We started by looking at homework, a Golden Threads mapping exercise done in discipline groups, Sea, White Water, Surf and Canoe, The notes are shown below.

The impact changing one element has on performance was discussed. That may be a related element further up the Golden threads that is the true issue, rather than the issue that presents to us initially.

Balance and trim is the tool we use to use and change the hull shape effectively so the top of the pyramid might be hull shape, direction, environment, power, down to a skilful performance at the bottom end.

Technical Understanding

Video your self

Video others

Books

DVD

Work with other coaches

Never stop learning

Oli Grau Book

Surf Kayak Skills web site

Sea – Doug Cooper, Nick Cunliffe, Gordon Brown

Eric Jackson

Ken Whiting – Playboating

Developing a Skilful Paddler

“The Ability to select the best technique to achieve optimum results in that situation”

TTPP

Tactical Technical Physical Psychological

Tactics are applying the right package of techniques in the right time and place.

Developing skill as a process

Technique

Varied Adaptations of Technique

Varied / Random Applications

Skilful performance

So that was an interesting class room session on how we or our students become skilled.

Next we moved on to Fitts and Posner Skill development levels, give a sheet with the six levels on, we went out and in three groups, paddled a variety of boats including white water racers, slalom boats, sea kayaks, k1 sprint, freestyle boats, spec c1. We assessed to the levels with much discussion. Our tutors introduced the observation funnel, from holistic through deductive processes to analytical via task setting on a clearly defined scale from 1-6. 

All this was in the pursuit of high quality observation and analysis to find the root issues to coach (as worked through with the golden threads exercise.

All this tied together our technical knowledge, observational skills, diagnosis, understanding of skill and more. Worthwhile.

Indoors again.

How we make it stick

On the board we had the memory model of Short Term Sensory Store,  Short Term Memory and Long Term Memory.

Short term lasts seconds, some is filtered to short Term Memory (working memory) then some filtered again to long term.

Pete Catterall used his lack of motivation at school to learn things and the subsequent gaps in his knowledge as he trained to become an instructor as an illustration of the need to motivate students with a reason to learn and thus get information into the Long term memory. Another nice illustration was the case where he was asked to help motive students who where failing at school but wanted to be instructors, he went through subject by subject the important elements for a career in the outdoors. Their schoolwork and motivation improved. We have had a similar experience with a work experience student ready to drop out of school, who is now in college studying outdoor ed.

Then followed a couple of memory exercises, first remembering a sequence of letters.

NGBLTADUKCMCUKCC

Some learnt by rote, some by silly acronyms, some by breaking down into groups of four or five, some by relating sequences to familiar sequences

The second exercise was to remember a group of about 20 images with results from 3 to 13, some purely by looking at the image repeatedly, some by making up a story with the items, some relating them to familiar locations etc.

Motivation was again an issue, Phil Hadley was turned off by the prize being a well done, but when he saw familiar sequences in the letters he switched on again.

Evening Session – Action planning

Time to start

We were shown five different action plans from level 5 trainees to get a feel for different approaches from memory map types, to lists to tree diagrams with date set goals, with mentions of outlook reminders and screen savers. The two re doing their training where clear that three years goes very quickly.

NB Working with your mentor / tutor is key to getting to assessment.

Some thoughts from these plans,

·         Be a beginner again

·         Get coached

·         Talk to other coaches

·         Get personal boating

·         Coach more canoe

·         Coach someone better than you

·         Video yourself for a model of good boating

I am away at Plas y Brenin this week, on their last Level 5 BCU Coach Development course and will blog day by day here with my notes and reflections on the course.

My specialism is White Water Kayak

Day One
 
After a half hour briefing we headed off to the Tryweryn on this, the last day of the season before the 6 week shut down, this is what we worked on on the river,

Understanding performance

Beginners straight lines

Pulling forward of the centre of resistance, Duracell bunny to body rotating power stroke

Edge and the v hull effect, directional stability and the squeeze effect, sailing analogy. Water hits the side of the boat, the boat is held by the v, so goes forwards rather than sideways.

Trim in kayaks, crossing the eddy line like riding a step up. Can remove the need for the squeeze.

Emphasis on boat positioning and playing with making every stroke a power stroke on alternate sides.

Playing with this on the graveyard particularly changing trim.

Observation of one of the coaches with a view to looking at position and use of waves, rocks and stoppers etc. All played with this.

Running the middle of the graveyard, then re running it with set pieces and getting feed back on our own paddling.

Highlights

• ·         Understanding momentum and resistance, push pull with beginners
• ·         Edge and the squeeze/sailing effect
• ·         Trim on eddylines, waves etc.

Back in the classroom a review of the day and a top thought from Pete Catterall,

Performance goes back to foundation level under high stress, make the foundation sound and as close to top performance as possible.

Home work was to produce a chart of golden threads, that take us from a beginner to a skilled paddler.