I have seen too many posts of people citing ghost lanes as the reason why wash riding didn't happen/wasn't a big deal. This is simply not true. Ghose lanes are just physical markers limiting how close a boat can get to another. Wash can and still quite often does still affect any team that is riding the edge of the ghost lane. Trust me, I have ridden wash in ghost lane races. Besides, you don't need to be extremely close to get the benefits of wash. The introduction of ghost lanes has definitely helped reduce the effects of wash riding (primarily for the lead teams) but it certainly hasn't killed off the benefits.

Yes. I agree. What is the point of this thread?

"I have seen too many posts of people citing ghost lanes as the reason why wash riding didn't happen/wasn't a big deal."

perhaps educating the unclean masses

Good luck!

wash riding can be only be stopped (or limited) by aggressive officiating in keeping guys in the middle of their lanes.

The Quebec Cup is very good at keeping people in order.

Cattle prods all the way down the race course?

Like this.

I'm laughing my ass off. thanks!

"wash riding can be only be stopped (or limited) by aggressive officiating in keeping guys in the middle of their lanes"

Don't ghost lanes serve the same purpose (without all the yelling)? The only real way to stop wash riding is to have separation between boats.

Say you have 5m lanes, if both teams are in the center of their lanes, there is 5m of separation.
If one team wants to ride wash, they hug the lane markers (assuming the lead team stays in the center), you now have 2.5m separation.

If you put a 2.5m ghost lane, then the closest the boats can come (assuming again the lead stays in the center and the rider stays in their lane)is 5m which achieves the same purpose as the aggressive officiating, without the randomness that is bound to be present

"Wash can and still quite often does still affect any team that is riding the edge of the ghost lane. Trust me, I have ridden wash in ghost lane races. Besides, you don't need to be extremely close to get the benefits of wash"

There should be nothing wrong with riding the wash as long as you stay within your lane. What is the alternative? stop paddling until the wash passes you by?

Wash riding can only be accomplished by shiatty teams who are in 2nd (or worse) place anyways. So if you're ahead, why worry? :-P

Boo!

I still don't get why is wash riding bad? It's part of the environment, wash is right there, just take it...

"There should be nothing wrong with riding the wash as long as you stay within your lane. What is the alternative? stop paddling until the wash passes you by?"

Too true. Sometimes it's just there and you can't do much about it. Officials often tell teams to "stay in the centre of their lanes", but they never do anything about it. That's why the ghost lanes are a good idea, but Ghost lanes with very WIDE lanes are even better. This would give a team the opportunity to move over and deny a team too much easy wash.

Wider the lane, and addition of ghost lanes, means fewer lanes. Unless you are racing in a completely bottom level huge pond. A lot of races are in shallow lakes, narrow rivers or small inlets. A set up suggested above would reduce Alcan's 9 lanes to 6.

Lane markers for only the start of the race, and finish markers for only the extreme left & right of the race (no finishing lane markers) and no "land" signs for targets is what Victoria has. The surrounding land is not parallel to the course, so you can't use it as a visual marker. And of course there is the current. Aggressive officiating (to the point of some steerspersons wanting to dunk the officials in the water) prevents wash riding there.

As for wash riding, if done right, such as long distance outrigger canoe races, the behind team could keep up with the ahead team using a lot less energy. They would then "kick-it-up" for the finish to win as the ahead team would have less energy than the behind team. If not done properly, the behind boat may not be able to control the boat well to travel straight, due to the wake. The behind boat may accidentally over-correct and touch the rear of the ahead boat and spin-it. On an extreme example, this is found in marathon running as well as NASCAR races.

I found this article from Alan Carlsson of Vancouver.
_______________________________________________________________________
wash riding in kayaks

A question was posted on OCPaddler.com about wash riding and I remembered reading an article on this way, way back when.

If you have learned to wash ride and are allowed to do it, it is very beneficial.

I’ve wash ridden back and forth with other boats for up to two hours and an organized pack of two or more boats will drop the rest of the field very quickly. It makes the race much faster and more tactical than essentially being out there in your own space. For some reason I work harder in a pack than alone, maybe its knowing that if I drop off the back I am truly watching the race walk away.

Not to mention that and turns are no longer simply a change of scenery, they are a time to drop or be dropped!


In flatwater canoe & kayak racing it is an accepted tactic and has significant effects on the race outcome. The wash riding boat is usually 5% lower in heart rate than if they were at that speed and leading and their oxygen consumption is approximately 12% lower.


For those who have a high “professor” or “geek” rating here is the abstract of an article published in 1995 on the physiological effects of wash riding in ICF kayaks.


The metabolic cost of two kayaking techniques (Gray, Matherson and McKenzie) The International Journal of Sports Medicine May 1995: Vol. 16 Issue 4. p. 250-254


A common technique employed in flatwater kayak and canoe races is “wash riding”, in which a paddler positions his/her boat on the wake of a leading boat and, at a strategic moment, drops off the wake to sprint ahead. It was hypothesized that this manoeuver was energy efficient, analogous to drafting in cycling. To study this hypothesis, minute ventilation (VE), heart rate (HR) and oxygen consumption (VO2) were measured in 10 elite male kayak paddlers (age = 25 ± 6.5 yrs, height = 183.6 ± 4.4 cm, mass = 83.9 ± 6.1 kg) during steady-state exercise at a standardized velocity in conditions of “wash riding” (WR) and “non-was riding” (NWR). The data were collected in field conditions using a portable telemetric metabolic system (Cosmed K2).


Statistical analysis of the mean values for VE, VO2 and HR was performed using the Hotelling’s T2 statistic and revealed significant differences between the WR and NWR trials for all three dependent variables.


Mean values for VE (l/min) were WR = 133 ± 16.5, NWR = 126.3 ± 15.7; for VO2 (l/min) were WR = 3.22 ± 0.32, NWR = 3.63 ± 0.3; and for HR (bpm) were WR = 167 ± 9.9, NWR = 174 ± 8.0.


It was concluded that wash riding during kayak paddling confers substantial metabolic savings at the speeds tested. This has implications for the design of training programs and competitive strategies for flatwater distance kayak racing.

Knowing that wash riding is beneficial to your speed is one thing, getting good at it is another and it takes lots of practice to learn how to wash ride properly. From a tactical point of view you may have to think kilometers ahead to the next turn or narrow point on the course to be well positioned in a pack. Even when surfing small waves positioning is important as being on the wrong side of another boat can compromise your race in no time.

Alan

Alan Carlsson
Engineered Athlete Services
More info: http://eascoaching.blogspot.com/atom.xml

yawn

Too bad Alan is a little weird.

so is wash-riding illegal because one team gets an advantage, or is it because in order to take the best advantage the boats have to be close together with the inevitable collisons that occur?

When a race offical tells you to get back to the center of your lane is it to prevent a team from taking advantage or is it because of safety.

Is that a question in disguise.

The rule is you stay in your lane. If there are no lane markers, then "lane" is really a matter of judgement and aside from contact with another boat you can pretty much do what you want.

Hence, washriding.