WWTCC News

E.R.R. 2oo9

Is it possible to go to Scotland and just have a normal paddling trip? In my experience no! This trip was no different it was a proper paddling adventure. The reason for heading far far north again was to take part in the 2nd ever Active River Race, the Active for thoughts who don’t know is a corking little river that flows west off Rannoch More in the highlands of Scotland. Last year the race experienced 18 hours of solid rain before the event witch turned the nice little river into a raging monster. The race that was to be held on the normal section of the river (triple falls down to Right angel falls) was caned and moved to the upper section, last year myself and Graham Milton of Fluxed shirt fame came first in the sponsored category, what happened this year I hear you all cry! Well read on………


(The Etive, Last year.)

I left London village bright and breezy Thursday morning and headed to collect my fellow team mate & mates from the kayaking metropolis of Nottingham, we then headed of into the night bound for Scotland. Gosh what a long way away that place is, after a lovely comfortable journey with no problems or issues we arrived! In the rain wind, cold, typical Scottish weather had a few beers in the local pub then fell asleep in there car park! Standard kayak practice. The next day, Friday the rain was still falling, but on the brighter side of life the river was full, Ish….
3 Or 4 runs down the Etive later, and a bow tie tying instructional video in the can, our race lines were dialed in and we went back to the pub! The race day was nearly here.
Saturday morning dawned surprisingly bright and sunny; we loaded up the car and headed off to the Glen Coe Ski centre, slightly of topic this place is up for sale! You must be able to do so much with that place, Bargain for someone. The river had now started to drop due to the uncharacteristically nice sunny weather and I think that may have given the early competitors a slight advantage, must not grumble though, Me & G set of for our race pretty much at the end of the day followed by Mr. T and JC. Now I don’t think we had the best run down, my small capsize was low point of the race for me! But we both nailed the big last drop at right angel, I finished about one inch behind Graham, we kept it close! Mr.T & JC were just behind us they both had solid runs down; Tom taking the NEW Burn for its first competitive outing was suitably impressed. Race done it was back to the pub! Do you see a pattern here? Then followed probably one of the best nights I’ve ever had in a pub, Good time. Amazingly me and Graham won the sponsored race AGAIN! Yeah….. The nice big trophy is back on the mantel piece & the £200 prize money, was drunk. The shine was taken off our win, only a little when we found out that we had been beaten by two 15 year old, but hats off to them, here are the excuses already! They must have had a good clean race, and they did start at the front end of the day with more water. Ha Ha, well done guys. Good slalom training winning threw there I recon. I forgot to take the camera out of me peli case for the entire trip luckily other people did take pictures and I will try to get some soon. Roll on next year.

posted by Pete @ 7:57 AM