Kindly Old Dr. K’s Hydrosphere

On Sunday July 13 we ran the two events I help organize: the Attainment Race and the Wave Surfing competition.  We had good water conditions for both events this year.

The Attainment Race was held at Difficult Run rapids, in a figure 8 loop as shown in the earlier post.  The average time for all racers was nearly 19 minutes, so there was plenty of lactic acid to go around.  Attaining has been a tradition on the Potomac for over 100  years and it’s as alive as ever.

The Wave Surfing event was held at Wet Bottom Chute, in the heart of the Mather Gorge.  Despite some early skepticism, this turned out to be the perfect venue for an old school hot dogging contest.  The wave was smooth and steady, allowing the full panoply of paddle spinning, paddle tossing, and air banjo tricks.  Ryan Bahn wowed everyone in his C-1, showing all that the entry on the official scoring sheet for standing up in the boat and surfing the wave was NOT a joke.  He opened the door and almost every contestant tried it thereafter.  I don’t have a picture of Ryan, but Jim Hubshman sat Potomac Paddlers says he got some great ones. 

Thanks to Adam Van Grack for convincing me to hold the event at Wet Bottom.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a group of whitewater paddlers having more fun than I did during and after the Wave Surfing event. 

Go to http://www.potomacfest.com/ for more pictures and results.

Attainment racers head upstream for Center Chute and glory.

Wind surfing wasn’t part of the contest, but loads of fun anyway.

Wave Surfers gather for the main event

A glassy wave on a sunny day.

Danny Stock and James Sneeringer

I’m not confident we will get the water levels needed for the Carderock course shown previously, so we’re going to move the race upriver a bit.  We will meet at Anglers Inn lower lot at 0800 for the competitors meeting and the race will start at approximately 0830.

The race will be a Figure 8 course.  We will start at the beach at Anglers put-in and race upstream to Center Chute of Difficult Run Rapids.  Attain Center Chute, then descend through Maryland Chute.  Cross back over to Center Chute and attain Center Chute again.  Descend through VA Chute and return to Anglers and finish by touching the beach at Anglers put-in. 

The course is about 1.5 miles long.  See the map below.