new rolling video - just recently out. It shows how to roll on dry land. Completely skips the water part. You can practice in your lawn or a park - wherever there is land! It's much easier to breath too! Once you master the dry land version you can try the wet version.
The one thing I like about it is there is no water to try to peer through to see proper body positioning.
If that doesn't work, how far are you from Albany? Maybe we can meet half way. Some video from a digital camera can work wonders.
~wetzool
Ben Lawry’s roll is very good But having taken forever to get a roll, I found Jay’s the best/easiest first roll.
I now try for Ben’s roll and if I blow it one or two times I use Jay’s roll - which works almost no matter what. Jay’s roll was my first reliable roll and it is still the roll I default to when all else has failed.
It was Ben’s roll at Sullivan Falls a week ago on which everyone complimented me for being so graceful executing in the tidal race. It is compact and efficient.
Didn’t Think Jay Gave Classes Celia, I think you are absolutely right about the developing bad habits. I did have a friend who is very knowledgeable about swwep rolls observe my attempts, and the bad habits that he observed were a tendency to do sort of a cross between a lay back and a C to C head dink (left over from training with a C to C trainer), and a tendency to push down on the blade halfway through the sweep.
They are quite nice I’ve seen them before. I especially like the segment where the person in the boat rotates her body around the cockpit 360 degrees. I think it says something about the sweep motion.
Thanks for your offer I must admit, I have not tried this new dry land technique.
I think I’m going to try out some of the good advice I’ve gotten from this post for a while. Of course, the water will be getting cool soon here, and I’ll retire to the pool.
If I don’t get anywhere this fall and winter, I may take you up on your offer next summer.
Thanks Think I’m going to try to debug on my own for a few more weeks. I prefer to work in warm water, so I may retire to a pool somewhere when the water cools off. If I’m still not there come next summer, perhaps I will accept your kind offer.
Lawry’s Roll You Mean? IMO Ben’s roll is a variety of sweep roll - the biggest thing is that he focuses on how to set up and center the body in the boat so that it automatically gets rid of a lot of excess motion.
Rolling is a simple skill that is easy to perform, but it’s not always easy to learn and sometimes incorrect notions get in the way. You really do roll a kayak in the same way that you roll-up to a sitting position when laying on the floor. The good news is that your eventual skill as a roller has little correlation to how long it takes you to learn, but why drag it out? Practice makes permanent, so if you are not suceeding you are probably reinforcing bad technique or a poor mental image of what a roll really is.
Why not just come to the Delmarva Paddlers’s Retreat in Delaware next month? Some of the world’s finest G-style teachers and rollers will be there including Cheri Perry and Freya Hoffmeister. My guess is that they would have you rolling in under an hour. Details at http://www.qajaqusa.org/
lalleluia is a classic paddling.net "hard case" with respect to rolling. While I admire his persistance, I'm not sure if asking for more advice from this venue is going to help him much. Especially, concidering that people here haven't seen his rolling attempts.
lalleluia, please take a class! If a class can't do it, the random suggestions made here won't help you (and they may hurt you).
"Some of the world's finest G-style teachers and rollers will be there including Cheri Perry and Freya" --> I'd think it would be full at this late stage.
You May Be Right But as Jay said, each person has to find his/her way, and I think I have have gotten some good suggestions for corrections from this post that I will try.
Although I work on this just about every week, I do not post about my rolling efforts often anymore, as I think would be asking for more than a board can offer if I did.
I have probably attended more rolling classes than the average person who has an inclination to learn this technique. I have taken one class this summer.