Wargrave Boating Club

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Canoe/Kayak Section

April 2013


Are you tired of not getting out on the River for half the year? Bored of sitting at home and darning your socks in front of the fire? Over the winter the canoe section have:

·         Been out on the river every week (except when Skiing!)

·         Paddled at Olympic venues

·         Paddled extreme white water rivers

·         Taken part in speciality courses

·         Competed in races

·         Just gone out for a quiet (!) paddle

 

So don’t vegetate – come and see what we have to offer, this year we will have:

·         Beginners' and improvers' courses

·         Juniors' courses

·         Gentle paddles (try new stretches of river)

·         Update sessions for people can kayak/canoe but haven’t been out for a while

·         Helpers' and instructor courses

·         Master classes (our instructors and experts from other clubs)

·         Trips 

ENJOY THE RIVER ALL YEAR

Chris and Joe

 Join us for:

Open Day paddle – 10am on Open day (20 April) 

12 noon on Open Day - sign up for mini, junior and adult courses.

Junior training - Tuesday evenings from 21 May

Adult training - Wednesday evenings from 22 May

Mini (Junior School age children) training - Sunday afternoons 2 and 30 June

GO Canoeing – Canadian trip – Sunday 19th May

 

GO Canoeing – ‘Experience’ (try different boats?)  – Saturday 25th May

 

GO Canoeing – Canadian trip – Sunday 26th May


We are delighted to offer some more advanced opportunities this season using external instructors:

Canoe Master Classes CM

Canoe Master classes will help improve your open canoeing skills and give prospective coaches the chance to receive expert tuition.

Free to club members that are helping out with any coaching sessions and £10 for everyone else. These will take place on 2 evenings: The 15th and 21st May

 Foundation safety and rescue training course  FSR

A British Canoe Union accredited 1 day course that will give you the skills you need to improve the safety of groups on the river and carry out effective rescues.  Free to club members that are helping out with any coaching sessions and £20 for everyone else. We have 2 days available the 19th and the 25th May.

Aquatic 1st Aid, 8 Hour course  A1A

This covers all the points of a general 1st aid course with an particular emphasis on the sorts of incidents that occur on the river.  Free to club members that are helping out with any coaching sessions and £20 for everyone else. The course will be on the 2nd June.

Level 1 Canoe and Kayak coach

This will give you the BCU's new level 1 coaching qualification.  Free to club members that are helping out with any coaching sessions. If you are interested you should speak to Joe Langham or Chris Jennings. We are looking at 2 weekends over the course of the summer in June, July or early August. 

For more info contact Joe at canoe@wargraveboatingclub.co.uk
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Sprint Canadian Canoes

posted 31 Mar 2009 07:48 by chris jennings   [ updated 31 Mar 2009 07:50 ]

Back in late October (when the river was a bit warmer!) WBC persuaded 2012
Olympic hopeful Karl Yurwich and his coach to bring a couple of sprint C1
canoes down to the club for our members to try out. (Incidentally, Karl did
pretty well in the canoe events at Wargrave & Shiplake this year too!).

Ok, so when it came to WBC members having a go in the less wobbly training
boat, most of us ended up swimming. For those that were not running to
changing rooms for their towels, there was Karl’s Olympic standard race boat
to try.
This monster is about the width of your knee and it seemed, to us, had one
purpose – to throw the Wargrave paddlers into the wet stuff. Needless to say,
we had another swim, except Karl who went out and stayed dry as a bone in
his jeans and t-shirt. We hope to persuade Karl to come back in the spring for
a re-match – WBC v The Beast.

Dart Trip

posted 24 Oct 2008 10:10 by chris jennings   [ updated 31 Mar 2009 07:54 ]

15th - 16th Nov
Accommodation at  at www.lowerblackaton.com  
 

A car park in Dartmoor on a cold November Saturday saw a group of 16 intrepid WBC canoeists together for a weekend of white
water fun. River levels were high and progress was 'rapid'. As usual, we had to stop just after Holne bridge for some of the
madder ones to throw themselves off only to fall 30 metres into freezing water! Clearly the rapids that we had negotiated earlier
hadn’t provided enough of an adrenalin surge!

Trouble at the Dart Country Park meant that we couldn't exit the river and so continued downstream to Buckfastleigh. As no-one
had paddled this stretch of river before, we were uncertain how far remained or what we might encounter; a big rapid that caught
many unawares and a weir that all but the very brave decided to take on was what we found. Eventually, when dusk was closing
in, amid pitiful cries of "are we there yet?" we spied our cars.

Some beers in the local pub and a night in a great B&B on Dartmoor (thanks, Sean) soon put us right. After a full fry-up on
Sunday morning, 13 of the group decided to paddle again, but exited at the bridge (strangely enough, no-one throwing
themselves off this time!).
Jane Swift

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