fitness paddling: exercise, train, race by kayak & canoe

Scott Mansker for Kansas City Info Zine:

"We've wanted to do this for a long time. We always thought there would be interest in such an event. Finally, the pieces came together."

The idea started when Mansker, a Kansas City native, was looking to enter some local races in his kayak.

According to Mansker, "There just wasn't much around here. To enter a long, expedition style race, you had to drive to Texas, Florida or Canada. I felt like there should be something here in the Midwest. And the Missouri River is just sitting there, waiting..."

The races in Texas, Florida and Canada have grown to be big events, attracting competitors from all over the world. People travel from as far away as Norway and Belize to compete.

"The Texas Water Safari," reports Mansker, "is billed as the 'World's Toughest Canoe Race.' I guess we'll see how our race ranks once it's done."

I missed humid heat of Texas Water Safari this year, so I decided to compensate a little bit by paddling Missouri River in August. I am not sure how my safari boat will handle with wind waves and barge wakes on the big river. It will be less challenging to cruise in my Sea Wind.

I am searching for information on the race course. Google Earth offers a pretty good view of the river. You can even see wing dikes and barge traffic.

A lot of information on paddling the entire length of MIssouri River including GPS waypoints for boat ramps is provided by David Miller book The Complete Paddler - A Guidebook for Paddling the Missouri River from Headwaters to St Louis.

The Channelized Lower Missouri has been engineered for large barge traffic; the Army Corps of Engineering (ACE) maintains a channel that is 300 feet wide and 9 feet deep. The river's meanders and its outside bends are typically lined with riprap, and the main channel runs along them. The inside bends are lined with wing dikes that exntend nearly perpendicular into the river. These feature constrains most of the river's flow between them, maintaining the channel. Many dikes have an "L-head" at their end, which angles downriver. The rock piles making up the end of these dikes run parallel to the channel and can be submerged. These are the most difficult to see. You need to stay in the main channel.

You have very good current on this cross-state stretch of the river. If you stay in the main channel and are not plagued by headwinds, you should easily average around 6 mph.

Since there is barge traffic on this section, you will need to be prepared to deal with large wake issues.

If water levels are are down, there are several long-established sandbars along the way where you can camp.

Some other resources:

• river maps from Lewis and Clark Bicentennial Commemoration website
• Missouri River Navigation Charts
• boat ramps pictures and description

Related post: Missouri River 340, August 2-6, 2006 - A new long distance race is beeing born
Posted at 11:04 AM