“Excuse me, miss,
I’d like to say,
your paddles held,
in awkward way.”
“Less fatigue,
efficiency,
if you reverse the blade,
you shall receive.”
“Why thanks old man.
That I shall try.”
As she paddled off,
sweetly reversed in lie.
“Excuse me, sir,
I’d like to say,
your paddles held,
in awkward way.”
“Less fatigue,
efficiency,
if you reverse the blades,
you shall receive.”
“Piss off old fart!
My way gets me there sooner!”
Perhaps some take it in later,
another Absorbine Junior.
I use my GP upside down and backwards!
What do you have to say about that Mr. Smart Guy 
I only bother if I see someone in April on 70° day and 40° water. But they think I nuts in my drysuit. They usually have no PFD. Three kids in two kayaks cold water no PFDs I CALLED THE CG
I am also very reluctant to offer unsolicited advice to strangers.
My wife usually doesn’t want any either!
Dunning-Kruger! I like it.
“I’m so dumb that I think I’m smart.”
“I’m smart, you probably are, too!”
Here we are with all our earned and accumulated knowledge and no one wants it. :#
Problem is you are telling them the correct methods when you should be texting it to them and if you put it on Facebook then it must be right.
@Yanoer said:
I use my GP upside down and backwards!What do you have to say about that Mr. Smart Guy
My GP actually has an up and down. It’s just a slight difference in the cut. No one else can see it though. It takes hours to feel it.
I admit to having to watch multiple videos to discern which face of my wing paddle was the front face.
I am one of the people who hates to get unsolicited advice. For me, it usually happens when everyone is gathered around a surf wave. There is often one know-it-all (usually a man, but not always), who feels they need to give everyone advice. I’ll paddle off and find another wave.
Upside down kayak paddle, I could care less. Using a bent shaft canoe paddle backwards, I’d probably have to say something about that as well. 
What I don’t understand is how people can launch at the ramp, paddle to the point and paddle back the 1/4 mile and be happy with it. But they do it every week. So I’m happy they are enjoying the water.
I find cyclists are the same way - ignorant of the basics. I see so many people peddling with their knees going higher than their handlebars because their seat is all the way down. How to they ride like that? I’ve actually adjusted people’s seats for them. Two minutes on YouTube would cover the basics for most recent sports.
Cool “human nature” thread magooch. I like your comment that you try to remain low key when offering advice…it seems like there must be some art to this. I would think that it’s hard to find an advice giver that can avoid “lecturing” combined with an advice receiver that is so open that they never get upset (or embarassed) no matter how the advice gets communicated.
I remember being on a river one time when a woman in a rowing scull fell out of her boat right near me in an area with lots of plants in the water, and no one else around. I asked her if she was OK and she said she was fine and she was clearly embarassed so I slowly paddled away (leaving her swimming)…but kept an eye on her until I knew she was OK.
Rather than telling anyone (men particularly) that they are holding it “wrong” or “upside down”, I just tell them that they will get a better boost in their technique by holding it the “other” way. As if it’s an “option” or a “performance tip”.
After decades of having to supervise guys in what are mostly male-dominated professions, I’ve learned that they often get stubborn and embarrassed when “corrected.” If I say “why not try this and see how it works for you”, they can figure out for themselves that it’s the better way to do it.
To me they are the same thing. Political correctness is growing a generation of wimpy men. If I’m wrong I want someone to tell me and then tell me the correct way.
@Overstreet said:
What I don’t understand is how people can launch at the ramp, paddle to the point and paddle back the 1/4 mile and be happy with it. But they do it every week. So I’m happy they are enjoying the water.
I’m with you on that one, but as you say, to each their own. In similar fashion, I once was rowing my guide-boat on the calm side of our biggest local lake on a very windy day, and a guy came along in a single scull and after nearly running me down (not watching where he was going), he asked me, ‘sort of’ a fellow rower, “where did you put in at?” I told him, while pointing to the other side of the lake, across more than three miles of whitecaps. He could hardly believe it, but he had the wrong boat for whitecaps and probably had no idea what would be possible with some other hull design. Plenty of people paddler their kayaks the same way.
It’s not “political correctness” that has compelled me to use that method of instructing proper technique, it has been pragmatism. When you are running critical multi-million dollar construction projects (as I did for a couple of decades) you need to do whatever works to make sure your people comply with proper and efficient and safe installation methods. I found that strategic psychology just worked better than outright demands or shaming ineptitude-- many male egos are delicate things (not my fault, guys, and I know it isn’t all of you, just some that are that vulnerable and pissy about a “chick” being smarter than them about something).
At any rate, the smarter and more enlightened guys always picked up right away what I was doing and appreciated that I made the “corrections” discreetly without making anybody look dumb. And even if the dumb guys did not catch on to the strategy, at least I got them to do the work properly by making them think it was their own idea or choice to do it the way I suggested.
It’s part of treating people with respect too.
I hate to tell you this but it works both ways. As a manager for two decades in corporate America women hated to be shown or corrected by a stupid man. (in their pc eyes). We (men) always had to have a witness present in order to kindly direct a female employee that wasn’t doing her job correctly. It was pathetic. If you didn’t have a witness many would have you in HR up on charges before the day was over. Thankfully I no longer work in that environment and I don’t miss it. I’d rather clean toilets for minimum wage (which I don’t do).
Right or wrong way aside, do we each understand why and can we each truly explain why a given method is correct or preferred without being bombastic? I have found by asking the other paddler why their technique is “right” to them opens a dialogue which sometimes allows me an opportunity to offer or perhaps accept a better solution. I use a GP and often introduce it as the paddle for dummies because each of the 4 ways to hold it are equally right unlike the 208 cm, asymmetrical, dihedral with 27 degrees of feather for high angle paddling my medium rough water Swede formed hard chined hull that Trevor used in his unsupported circumnavigation of some isle of Narnia. I also find many newer paddlers are simply unaware of the myriad of choices and implications of something as simple as a kayak paddle and do not care and will blissfully paddle away while my BP goes ballistic.
My wife has taught me a lot about how to approach people in regard to instructing, or correcting them. She has no patients at all and doesn’t like to be shown how to do anything. When she is dealing with a new process on one of her tablets I have to be very understanding and sympathetic about how “dumb these electronic devices are” to keep her from just giving up.