Brass Monkies

Good lord it was cold on the water today! With Hurley down to 2 and the baltic weather conditions only a hardy few ventured forth for a session. For once I took the camera down to take some snaps.
Hugh and Finn were joined by Pete and Dan. Pete, believe it or not, hasnt been on the water for about a month after catching malaria in Uganda- quickly got back into the swing of things as you can see!









The rest of the photos from the session are here

And a few more piccies!

These photos of last weekend come courtesy of Andy Wicks, who managed to take some great shots with a busted nose and a cheek fracture! Great little session at a fun level.

Flipping out
Wind it up...

...and let it go :)

Backstab

Blunt number 3,257

Matt

Weir sessions

Had some great weir sessions over the past couple of weeks as the level has dropped at both marsh and Hurley. Really good fun, great company and some big moves being landed. The following photos were taken just after Hurley dropped to 3 on Friday. Many thanks to Steve (aka evolvedlight) for letting me use his photos... they look really cool :0)

Hope everyone has a great Christmas and I hope to see you all on the water in 2009 :0)

Matt

Hurley Classic

The Hurley Classic is one of the oldest events on the freestyle calender... it has been around since the sports birth and has always tried to keep in touch with the sports roots- the emphasis is on having a laugh!

This year it rained- a lot- and the river rose rapidly on the Saturday from an awesome steep green three in the morning to a pretty awful high holey three come Sunday morning, the day of the competition. This was soon remidied when the lockie opened up the final gate to give a big 4 gates for the comp- bring on the carnage!



This really levelled the playing field- it was going to take big moves and linked moves to score high- otherwise you would be scrapping it out in the middle of the pack. There was also plenty of scope for a few beatings- always a crowd pleaser :0)

The competitors were split into 8 heats with 7 or 8 in each heat. All the categories were mixed together, which made for a wide variety of skill levels in each heat- the idea being that the better paddlers helped out the less experienced ones. These heats would run in a jam style lasting 15 minutes with each paddler getting 30 seconds a time to rack up a decent score. The top 5 in each category then progressed to a super final run to international rules.

There was some great talent on view with the better paddlers linking some big moves- Alan Ward threw a massive mcnasty in my heat with Lee Pyke, Joe Bradley and others throwing big loops front and back.

As the competition progressed it was obvious who the top guys and girls were going to be but the rest of the paddlers were very close and the competition was fierce, but friendly.

For many this is their first taste of competition and despite some seemingly odd judging decisions I think everyone seemed to have a great time at a well organised event- must say a big thanks to Garry who kept us all in hot food and drink and to the Kayakojacko team for their organisation of another great event.

For the record I think I came about 13th in the mens Kayak With Alan Ward Coming out on top just beating Ed Smith, Finn was about 11th in the Juniors with Joe Bradley and Ben West topping the table, and Hugh in his first competition did real well, even going for (and in my humble opinion sticking) a Donkey Flip! For the full results go and check out www.tvfreestylers.co.uk .Be great to see a few more of you there next year :0)

Matt

Riverside Shop Christmas Opening Times

Tuesday 23rd December 11am – 7pm
Wednesday 24th December 10am – 3pm

Come in on Christmas Eve for a mince pie & a 20% discount!

Thursday 25th December CLOSED
Friday 26th December CLOSED
Saturday 27th December CLOSED
Sunday 28th December CLOSED
Monday 29th December CLOSED
Tuesday 30th December CLOSED
Wednesday 31st December CLOSED
Thursday 1st January CLOSED
Friday 2nd January 10am – 6pm
Saturday 3rd January 9am – 5pm
Sunday 4th January 10am – 1pm
Monday 5th January CLOSED
Tuesday 6th January Normal Opening
Hours Resume

Happy Crimbo!

Seeking forgiveness not approval

Yesterday saw Catherine & myself pay a visit to the guys & girls at Palm Equipment & Dagger Europe, to collect a few boats.......

No Space left in one of our boat stores now!!!

So as you can see we now have a huge collection of Islander Sit on Tops for you to try or buy... and behind all of this lot happens to be a load of lovely Dagger Creek & Play Boats.

Watch this space for more info on how to come and use on of these great Islander Paradise 1's, Paradise 2's and Hula's. More fun than you can shake a paddle at :-)

Lastly if you see us at Hurley Freestyle this weekend be sure to get a NEW free Riverside. Oxford sticker off us.

Be safe

Rob

Pyranha Karnali Review

A couple of weekends ago a load of people from riverside headed to South Wales to do their Four Star Kayak Training and Assessment, plus a whole bunch of Dons on an Open Boating Weekend.

I was very kindly offered a place on the Four Star Training (Thanks for a great course Roger and Dennis). Now if you don't know me at all then to say I don't spend much time river paddling is an understatement- don't think I have been in a river boat proper in about 10 years! This means that my extensive boat collection does not contain a big floaty thing that is required for such courses. Catherine came to the rescue and leant me the Karnali- apparently its new and everything!

Outfitting
The boat is fitted out with the latest Connect 30 outfitting. Anyone who has paddled a boat with this in will tell you how easy it is to adjust and sort out ready to paddle. It's also very comfortable with it, allowing a fair amount of adjustment whilst seated in the boat, which is great if you need a bit of a stretch but don't want to/can't get out of the boat to do it.

The stern storage space is vast- I could have been smuggling knock off TV's all weekend and been none the wiser. Due to the back rest system this is really easy to access and load with some good solid clip points.

The deck also is covered in a multitude of solid looking steel cip points for all your possible rescue needs- seem easy to access from the boat and are deep enough to easily clip a karrabiner into with one hand.

First Impressions
If you look at the hull there are no reall edges to speak of, which makes for a really forgiving boat. Mistakes which would be punished in other boats just seem not to affect this one. This is great for the novice and expert alike, as it really instills confidence in the boat. This confidence is backed up by the boats secondary stability- now I don't know how they have manged this but it really doesnt capsize unless you really try quite hard, or you need it to. For a big boat it also rolls suprisingly easily.

For a longer boat it breaks in and out really nicely and ferries controllably front and back, holding its line really well. It also turns well on the spot if required. This entire package makes for a boat that is really manouverable with no nasty hidden suprises.

And the rest
Ok so thats the basic systems check- what about the fun stuff! This thing hole rides like a dream- the boats has the merest hint of a planing hull but it spins easily and unlike many river boats is a fairly stable platform that doesnt bounce around all over the shop.It isn't the nippiest on a wave (funny that) but it is easy enough to manouvere and to move around the river using them.

It boofs drops really nicely, providing plenty of entry speed combined with the ease of which you can pull the front up and keep the boat good and flat. The boat surfaces quickly and punches through anything unpleasant with ease.

Summary
Why have one? Well it's as good a river runner as I have seen, with the latest outfitting, its easy to paddle and it comes in lots of pretty colours- oh and it costs £650 (no. that isn't a typo, it really does!), so, quite frankly, why spend the extra money on something that will do exactly what this can? No, I can't think of any reasons either!

All the details and pictures and stuff are on the Pyranha website (http://www.pyranha.com/), or pop into the shop and speak to Catherine. They seem to have done 2 sizes so far (a M and a L) and there is talk of a S.

Matt

It's getting cold...

With the winter Temperatures closing in fast, it almost seems too cold to go playboating... almost.

We took the Camera, tripod, warm clothes, went to Hurley and had a good time!
Arriving at 3pm we had about an hour of daylight to get some video down, which we did... here it is, Me, Hugh and a bit of Doug Cooper (TV Freestylers) busting some moves.


Freestyle Kayaking - Winter Time Hurley from Finn Burrows on Vimeo.

Bring on summer...

Talk @ Riverside

Hey everyone, really sorry to say that Lowri Davies has had to cancel her talk at Riverside on the 11th :( but to save the day, Chris Eastabrook has very kindly offered to come and give us a talk instead!

Young Men, Old Mountains - A Kayak Adventure in Tibet

The expedition took place in late August and September 2007, and headed to the Yarlung valley in Eastern Tibet in search of previously un-paddled rivers.... For me the trip had everything I could possible want; first descents on big volume runs & steep technical creeks, multi-day action, classic Himalayan road problems, drunken nights in small towns and a good mix of terror and lots of laughs!

Don't Miss It!

Thursday 11th December from 7pm at Riverside
Tickets £5 over 19’s; £3 under 19’s in advance, £1 extra on the night

Riverside Centre Oxford
Donnington Bridge
Oxford OX4 4AZ
T ++44 (0) 1865 248673
E riversidecentre2@btconnect.com
W www.riversideoxford.co.uk

The magic Number

As promised the final installment of last weekends Hurley fest!

Lowri Davies Talks at Riverside

Lowri Davies is best known as one of the World’s top female freestyle kayakers including being European Champion. However, making small boats spin on every axis while flying through the air is not her only paddling proficiency…

Last year Lowri was selected as one of 8 top white water paddlers for the British Universities Kayak Expedition to explore some of the wild rivers of Siberia, Mongolia and Kazakhstan. The team paddled big volume multi-day rivers through inescapable gorges and ticked off first descents. However, they faced as many obstacles off the water; guns, bribery, arrests, and car crashes to name but a few!

Come and share Lowri’s life and adventures
paddling for 10 weeks in Central Asia
as the only female on the team...
Thursday 11th December from 7pm at Riverside
Tickets £5 over 19’s; £3 under 19’s – advanced booking only

Riverside Centre Oxford
Donnington Bridge
Oxford OX4 4AZ
T ++44 (0) 1865 248673
E riversidecentre2@btconnect.com
W www.riversideoxford.co.uk

A Hurley Weekend

Still recovering from a couple of long sessions at Hurley. Arrived saturday to find it on 2 gates with no one else around... bonus! Wave was flushy but if you got it right you could fly.



After a night of heavy rain Sunday provided us with a pretty good 3 gates and the appropriate crowd! Great little session with everyone trying out all sorts of stuff.
Attached is a vid of Saturday... the one of sunday will be up soon... enjoy :0)

Matt

Winter playboating pictures...

Well, i thought i might as well put up some pictures from sessions past and present from Hurley weir.


Matt Throwing down


Over the last few months we've had some sweet water levels, but most of the time we've been paddling rather than taking pictures... anyway here's a few.


Me and Hector - double surfin'



Hugh Going for the Airscrew!


Blunt!

When the water levels drop around here we all mission down to Chertsey weir, not very many photos taken but here's Hugh pretending to do something.



Enjoy the pictures...
More to come very soon!

Finn

Escape from the Valley

Well with all the non existant water that the valley has been suffering Me, Finn, Hugh Graham and Paul Scopes decided to brave the North and go to HPP for the day.

After managing to negotiate several psycho lorry drivers and some dodgy last minute junction decisions we rocked up at the whitewater course.

The course has changed a lot since I was last there, but we found a couple of pretty good spots to session around the course. The inlet wave is great fun, easy to set up on and maintain. Finn considered this no sport at all renaming it losers hole. He went off in search of pastures new- me being old and stuck in my ways sessioned the top wave till I thought my head would explode- proper cold!

Finn, Hugh and Paul spent most of the session at a small wave just above the looping pool. Good little hole that got a bit stickier as the level dropped. The hole rewarded good technique and as Finns vid shows you could throw some pretty big loops in it. They then moved onto the muncher- not as good as I remember but Finn nailed a couple of big mcnasties in it and Hugh was getting close too.

Check out the vids. The first is of my top wave session (gratuitous amount of me I am afraid).



The second is the guys. Mainly on the small hole above the looping pool, but also has footage of the muncher and losers hole. Enjoy!


Matt

Welcome to the Riverside Shop!

We have some exciting new arrivals in the shop, the Pyranha Z.ONE and Karnali arrived with great expectations on Thursday. The RRP on them is £649 so they are great as a first boat. Why not pop in and give one a try? we have a demo boat in each. The Karnali is currently only available in large and the Z.ONE in medium, as soon as the other sizes arrive i will let you know.....

The Mens Streetwear.......

Also new in store, the 2009 range of Sweet Streetwear, including the ladies and mens range of hoodies, tees, shirts and hats.

The 2009 helmet range is due to arrive in April, including Strutters, Rockers and the new Wanderer so watch this space......



The Ladies Streewear....

Shop Opening Hours.....

Tuesday 11am - 7pm

Wednesday 11am - 7pm

Thursday 11am - 8pm

Friday 10am - 6pm

Saturday 9am - 5pm
Sunday 10am - 1pm

All shop profits are put back into the Riverside youth club activities, staffing and trips......

House Halloween Night Paddle

Well, for all of you that missed the House Halloween night paddle, how much fun it was! There was a paddle to the tunnel by Folly bridge with spooky vines and horrid creepy crawlies, stopped for some blood soup then returned to the centre for eyeballs. Here are a few pictures for you, hope to see you next time!

Cath

Remember Norway?

A little look back at our trip to Norway in August, fun times, here's the video!



Enjoy!