Michele Ramazza's Blog (17)

The new event in Europe was interesting and it offered good races and very nice alpin style kayaking. All the rivers were quite high and the valley was very nice under the spring sun.

The first edition of the OutdoorMix, the multisport event in the Durance Valley (France), has shown its potential to grow this year. The organization has done a very nice job organizing all the races in time and respecting the expectations of all…

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This is the reason why the dams are a very stupid way to spend money in the river...

I think in this video shows clearly the normal death of this walls built in the river. The river don't like concrete in its bed. I do believe the only possible action to slow down rivers is to create natural looking rapids with big rocks.

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The experience at the WWGP has been really positive for me. Good fun and new friends with different styles. It's always a great chance to improve your skills.

Watch the video!

White Water Grand Prix 2012

This video can help you to better understand the paddling movement.

Two important elements of the movement are presented and explained separately to be combined afterwards:

Torso rotation

Arms movement

More technique tutorial on…

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Between the 4th and the 7th of October 2012, 150 of the world’s best whitewater kayakers from 30 different countries will meet in Tirol, Ötztal Valley, to determine the Adidas Sickline Extreme Kayak World Champion 2012 on the legendary “Wellerbrücke” river section. Michele and all the other best paddlers are training hard to compete in one of the more challenging race of the year.

 

The race is going to start on Friday 5th with the qualifications in the lower…

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In Piemonte there are many rivers flowing down the west Alps. The most famous are the Chiusella, Soana and Stura. However there are other very nice creeks where is hard to find water but lucky kayakers can find spectacular runs.

The 2012 winter has been quite dry here in Italy. However, this spring the rain has decided to fill up some rivers..so the last week-end I decided to move to west Alps near Torino, to paddle with the Adidas team member…

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After the super-heavy snow falled in Italy in February 2012 the temperature rised quickly and the fast melting of the 2.5 meters of snow rised the water on few Italian rivers. Generally these rivers have water only due to the rain...but for the first time we managed to paddle in the Appennins with good snow melting flows!

This year a record snow falled on the area where I live, in Italy. In some villages the snow reached 3 meters and some people had to go…

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The kayak rotation comes from the power of the arms. Wrong, a good kayaker is able to turn it mainly using the body rotation to direct the boat. Only through the comprehension of this movement is possible to make a big step forward in the kayak technique.

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One of the first rules to be observed while you are learning to kayak is that your instinct is often probably wrong. Everybody try to turn the boat using the power of the arms to do more and more powerful…

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The boof is the move used to jump any obstacle in a river. In this technique article on the boof you will find the explanation of this fundamental white water move and the timing to do it in the right place at the right time.

Getting in and out of the canoe can be often difficult. This video explains the system I use to enter and exit from the river. This technique allows to board and disembark from the kayak in every possible situation, on high banks, muddy or where it is necessary to climb.

This technique helps also where the water is not completely still. Many times we can avoid ruining our kayak on stones doing seal-launching.…

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Voss (Norway), Friday July 1st 2011

Brandsethelva is a narrow river with crystal clear, blue water. The 500 meter long section where the competition took place holds many good spots for spectators to see fascinating and technical moves in the water.

The river is characterised by being narrow and steep, which makes it a technically challenging river and very spectacular. The water flows has been high all week and all the athlets couldn't paddle the race course…

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The Power stroke is a propulsive action to push the boat forward using the body movement. It can be used to perform many operations in white and flat water with freestyle and creek boats. This stroke is very effective while getting into an out of the eddies and to boof (jump an obstacle). In flat water allows simple circular path through a series of strokes inside of the curve. This stroke is important to learn how…

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Each river nestled in the mountains is invaluable. The scenarios created by the water are wonderful and often revealed only to paddlers.

These are some memories I want to share with everyone before they disappear forever.

The value of one of the most beautiful rivers in Europe, the Rizzanese (southern Corsica), has been sold out for political reasons.

The dam and the pipeline are almost ready… Continue

The stroke I'm going to present now has been one of the most complicated maneuver to teach and to learn. The aim of this post is to put order and, why not, physics, to understand what I call the draw rudder. I use basically only this stroke to change direction because is the most efficient way not to loose speed and to avoid the drifting effect.

For most kayakers this theory could sound quite different to what they learned in the kayak courses. I built up this theory to give a good…

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How to make a grip on the shaft of your paddle?

I think the better way to do it is to create a handle over your shaft with the shape of your hand. In this way you can control much better the angle of your paddle. You can use this system in any paddle on the market.

To make it you need to clean the shaft with sand paper and alcohol.

Then, with two nuts of paste for car body, you need to create a grip with the shape you prefer using also…

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Soon or later, everybody will hit the nose of the kayak in this way:

It's not a kayak fault, it's our fault. However this kind of damages, if the plastic is not broken, are really easy to fix. Now we'll learn to make the plastic malleable and reduce the indentation.

First of all you need to warm up the material either in the middle of the indentation and the edges. You need to be careful to do not melt the plastic, but just warm it up until you… Continue

This is the first technique article which aims to show what I do to have the best results in class V or races. What I'm presenting now is one of the first stroke to control curves with creeks and freestyle boats.

The rudder is the most efficient stroke to control the direction and keeping speed during a curve. This stroke prevents the kayak to move side wise and thus to loose energy.

To make a rudder you have to begin with straight speed and suddenly leave the…

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