I have paddled kayaks half a dozen times over the years with no instruction and no pain.
I finally signed up for a lesson in a sit-in kayak, during which my hip flexors cramped up 6-8 times over four hours.
I’ve done an internet search and found claims of various causes: hip flexors are too tight due to not stretching them (on a regular basis); hip flexor muscles not strong enough; weak glute muscles; and a kayak that forces my legs to be nearly straight at the knee.
So, I’m confused. Are all of the above possible causes?
Having only been in a kayak approximately six times over more than even just a single year, your body is woefully unprepared to spend four hours in a kayak using muscles you don’t normally use.
I’m not sure about the idea of straight legs. Some may disagree, but this definitely isn’t the way I’d be fitting a boat for myself.
I always applaud someone’s efforts to learn more about paddling, so I’ll say “keep at it” but none of the required skills and muscles will be built in a short time. Start off with shorter sessions and build to the marathon paddles.
An additional thought is that, along with tight and/or undeveloped muscles, you may be tensing up and fighting the motion of the kayak. Many kayaks are ‘tender’ and will have small motions off center. When you are unfamiliar with where the secondary stability comes in you may be tensing up and fighting the motion. Given enough seat time your response can become unconscious and your hips will free up.
@rival51 said:
An additional thought is that, along with tight and/or undeveloped muscles, you may be tensing up and fighting the motion of the kayak. Many kayaks are ‘tender’ and will have small motions off center. When you are unfamiliar with where the secondary stability comes in you may be tensing up and fighting the motion. Given enough seat time your response can become unconscious and your hips will free up.
rival51, I was definitely tense so I think you’re onto something. During class, much of the time I felt like I was ‘juggling four balls’ in terms of how many ‘moving parts’ I was trying to keep track of: keep ‘upper hand’ around eyebrow level; don’t let the ‘rectangle’ formed by my arms and chest collapse; maintain the correct angle of the paddle when one blade is in the water (I had a tendency to keep the blade-in-water too close to the kayak); push against the footpeg with the ‘same side’ foot; correct for my constantly going off course; sit up straight (I have a tendency to lean back for no reason). I found it impossible to relax when thinking of so many things. Obviously, relaxing comes with practice.
First thing to realize is that even once you get as limbered up and flexible as you can for your body, the stretch you have in your hip area and hamstrings is not going to be the same everyone else you paddle with. It is pretty individual. I can take nearly straight legs, but have been out with excellent paddlers that can’t match my angle without pain. I just happen to have more flexibility in my hips than the average bear.
Second is that you likely were tense and making it worse, like anyone else would have been in your place. One concept with edging that reduces tension is to not try and edge by applying muscle to lift either side of the boat, but to slide your butt a bit into the bilge and let your weight put the boat on edge. But that is a leap of faith for someone starting out, to be over in the water and stay relaxed. If you had a lot coming at you I doubt that was going to happen.
If you were pulling to one side a lot you likely were getting some weight off center, but with trying to keep all the instructions straight you were not aware of it. I suspect that as you are able to relax more you will find a lot of this abates.