CHECK IN AT WESTMINSTER

A great turnout for our Beginner Rolling Session at Westminster School Tuesday evening with eight rollers on their way to learning the process for achieving a successful roll. Anne and Simon Langsford conducted the training drills supported by Charlie Walker and Scott Zrna with Mark Loram looking on wishing he was in the water while photographing. Our budding rollers were Nathan and Zac Elgar, Pawel Winiarz, Ron Hamilton, John Glover, Anthony Keller, Berny Lohmann and Michael Grundy. Nathan was helping son Zac consolidate his off side rolling.

We started off the session with introductions followed by matching everyone up with the range of whitewater kayaks we had nominated for the training. A few adjustments were required to get everyone into their boats, but all worked out well. Anne and Simon then had the group working out and limbering up with a range of warmup exercises to minimise the chance of injury, before getting on water for more warmup. As well as Daggers we had a few Jackson kayaks in the group, and I’m sure Eric would have been proud of how the session progressed.

This was the first of two beginner roller sessions, so the emphasis was on getting the group comfortable with capsize and exit before working on edging techniques and supported bracing using the benefit of paddle floats.

The evening was very successful and I could see plenty of smiling faces. Many Thanks to Westminster for access to the pool and to Anne and Simon, Charlie and Scott for conducted the training drills.