It’s the bottom hand and it’s just too thick. There is no way to hold it just in my fingers.
Here’s another little video. Notice how loose the paddle is in his lower hand. He actually opens his hand as the paddle turns with his top hand.
As I said, thick paddle and small hands here. The people in your videos wear large golf gloves. I wear a cadet small. Go to the store and examine that. There is no paddle with a shaft thicker than electrical conduit that can be hooked in my short fingers. The issue has been identified and resolved.
Thank you, that’s the right idea. However, I think you may have forgotten a zero on those grits. I addressed it with steel wool and it went from tack to slick in five minutes of work.
Way too coarse. I wouldn’t do that with less than 220 but would much prefer 320 or 400.
Did you end up thinning the handle or just removing the finish?
Well I hope you let us know if that works for you.
I think you and TW are right in that a much finer grit is just fine (finer 
) if all you want to do is knock off the gloss. I’m a big fan of an oil finish on wood paddles so whenever I’ve modified a varnished paddle shaft I’ve removed the varnish entirely which can be quite a bit of work.
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Took it out this morning before the gale warning and it’s an improvement. I also had to put gloves on for a few minutes because it’s 32 out. I experimented with all of the strokes and my thumb is just integral to using this paddle, especially with my preferred Canadian stroke. A lot of my paddling is wildlife or fish watching. I can see that the pitch is faster and more efficient, but it’s more for covering ground.
As for videos, I put on Bill Mason and saw how he was holding his paddles. He has his wrist cocked on his bottom hand to help cradle his paddle in what looks like small hands. I would guess my hands are even smaller than his and these paddles, although lightweight and local, are just huge in cross section.
Thanks all
Going to sound silly, but why not just wear gloves?
I’ve already mentioned that, twice above, as have others. I might wear fingerless gloves when first training early in the season until my skin toughens, although I prefer to go gloveless in most cases whenever I can. But I do now train before the outdoor season on a canoe paddling machine, so I rarely bother with gloves at all anymore unless the water and air are very cold. To me, the feel of the paddle reacting with the water and handling are improved with naked hands on the paddle shaft and grip. Gloves will get uncomfortably soggy and smelly (very smelly, trust me) if worn all day during long distance canoe trips.
Here’s a high performance version of the J-stroke, more a C: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWFRXzoROXs
A few comments about C1. First, it’s hard to balance. I tried a beginnerish (i.e. not too narrow) boat by the dock once. One person held the bow and another held the stern. I stayed up for about 5 seconds. It’s so hard to balance that all you do at first is brace. I’ve heard that it takes about 3 weeks to take a forward stroke. I did not know that they do a steering stroke. That’s cool. Also, if you want to know the best way to do something, ewatch the pros. They push harder and longer than anybody and know how not to get injured. If they don’t get blisters or carpal tunnel, they must be doing something right.
I had a physician friend who was quite athletic and had been a member of a rowing crew in a northeastern Ivy League college. The captain of his rowing crew had Olympic medal ambitions and was quite the superman. For various reasons he decided that rowing would not be a path to an Olympic medal so he decided on Olympic C1 flat water canoeing and acquired a used boat.
I was told by my friend that it took him over two weeks of intensive practice before he could get into the canoe, paddle six feet from the dock, and return without capsizing.
I might mention that the mechanics of the stroke from the high kneel position is somewhat different from that used by a sitting or kneeling boater in a traditional canoe. The stroke excursion is well forward which tends to reduce its tendency to yaw the canoe. And the boats are so narrow that the yaw moment created by the forward stroke is much smaller than in a wider, traditional canoe, so much less correction is needed to maintain heading.
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Any canoe will be much more stable when it is moving through water than when it is stationary. I’ve never been in or even seen an Olympic class C1 up close, but would like to try. Of course these are not the C1 canoes most people in the recreational racing world have.
When I was 18 there was a local race and a coach invited me to try a high kneel C1. He was impressed that I didn’t immediately fall over, so I went out with him 3-4 times. He still had to steady the boat from the back while swimming but I started to get so I could do a small correction at the end.
Unfortunately I then went away to college and took up Marathon C1 instead as there were more races locally and people to train with. Would like to get a stable C1 if such a thing exists, like a Kape Joker.
– Andrew
Thanks again everyone for the input. Did 24 miles solo downstream on the Pere Marquette yesterday and no issues with my thumb. The fix was a combination of a callous forming and the steel wool work on the paddle shaft. Still need to find a narrower paddle shaft. Working on my weak side paddling technique now, though, because that was a workout.
Here is a close-up video of Marc Ornstein, the former national freestyle champion, demonstrating how to paddle a canoe straight. You can clearly see how he uses his shaft hand and what he does with his thumb:
Here is the same video slowed down to quarter speed:
Yes, thank you, I got this from Marc today, too.
I would never strongly critique Marc, but his J demo video at 1x is shown as very deliberate and hesitating, probably because it is done as a demo for effect. In reality, I don’t think you need to wait that long with the J in the correction ruddening position. I think the whole stroke with end correction phase is normally done as a single smoothly executed continuous motion without any definite hesitation at any point before immediately exiting the water to the recovery portion of the stroke. It is not wrong to include the hesitation, but it is not necessary, particularly if you include some form of pitch stroke.
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