the surface area of your hand will provide you a little more support. Last I practiced hand rolling, I grabbed a small goofy-shaped piece of foam lying near the water to help me get started. They actually make hand paddles that would work very similar to a ping pong paddle. Once you get the body movement down, any old piece of junk can offer a little extra resistance for your hand if you need just a little extra push at the end. Wear a cap and use the bill. When you go under, you grab your hat so you don't lose it, and then you use it to roll back up. That could be the next big safety gear thing - the "cap"size.
Edit: Sorry, I started the post, got interupted, came back to it and posted. Didn't see the previous post. I guess Jay gets the rights to the "cap"size.
rolling using a ping pong paddle i recently bought the brooks AVATAQ inflateble float. i m very happy with it…i can do all kinds of exersices
laying in the water, using the body and focusing on being smooth…as you understand im not a great roller, but i can shift sides with a steyr roll/chest sculland roll in waves if i have to… using the avataq helps me a lot these days.its pretty to…looks like a little dophin head once inflated…
i almost bought one of these… but i have a big rutabaga paddle float that works almost as well and saved me a lot of $$$$. i actually have 2 paddle floats (one is mesh on 1 side) and i really like it…it doesn’t hold water. i am down to 1 slightly under flateted(hmm, is this a word?)paddle float for my rolls. so happy i am finally getting to roll. It’s hard to get someone that can go out and help you.don’t think doing it alone is a good idea.
Yup It’s been a couple of years, but we messed around with a ping pong paddle in some pool sessions. It works, really the same as having anything that floats in your hand. You just need to be able to work within the floatation provided.
Hand paddles, like used for whitewater, work well too.
Great tool, but use CAUTION In many years of rolling, including competition Greenland rolling, I have only hurt my shoulder twice, and the first was when I was learning to hand-roll with a ping-pong paddle. When you are working on a hand roll (with or without an aid such as a ping-pong paddle, norsaq (throwing stick),etc), the danger is that you have such freedom of movement that if you use poor form, you can easily get your shoulder into a dangerous position, or even cause a dislocation.
In my case I tried to “help” a marginal roll by extending my sweeping arm too far behind my torso, to where my arm was fully extended behind me (classic dislocation position). Combined with too much force and speed, this can cause a severe injury. In my case it felt like an extreme impingement – as if someone had stabbed me in the shoulder. It resolved itself OK, but be careful. Practice the roll motion slowly and deliberately and keep your arm movements linked to your chest (paddler’s box).
To elaborate, if you want to extend your arm(s) behind you, you must also rotate your torso. I was following advice in Hutchinson’s book that recommends for one hand-rolling technique that you must keep your back flat on the aft deck and sweep your arms. While I understand what Derek was getting at (keeping your torso aft), I consider this very dangerous advice as it guarantees that you are moving your arms independently of your torso.
handrolls etc. thats exactly why i like the avataq. the handles are positioned so its easy to keep them in th box. it moves nicely in the water too…smooth body motions and general “gettinhg used to being in the water” is what i need. after a little worm up with the Avataq i roll much better with any paddle.
what about swimming gloves? same problem perhaps?
oh yea the avataq looks really nice inflated. its my amulet from now on. the killerwhale7dolphin looks tempts me to paint some eyes and a mouth on it.
swim fins I learned to hand roll using a borrowed pair of the hand fins that swimmers use for laps.
They fit over your hands and give you sufficient lift without you having to grasp something or hyper-extend your shoulder which, as Greg pointed out, is a possibility with a ping pong paddle.
seal/dolphin… I assume that you know why the avataq looks like a dolphin… A real one is an entire (small) seal skin that is inflated. Brooks copied a seal-skin version from Greenland and theirs is very authentic, down to the “neoprene flippers” that stick out. I agree that an avataq is a great tool for practicing/teaching rolls and I have two myself. The buoyancy is so great that it is more difficult (but not impossible) to push it underwater to hyper-extend a shoulder, as compared to a ping-pong paddle, swim gloves, etc.
Another good rolling tool for hand rolls is to stick your hand deep into a paddle float (same warnings for shoulder-caution still apply).
yep ditto on the webbed swim gloves. You can work on it with your fingers spread, and then when that’s easy, work on it with your fingers together, and ultimately lose the glove. (I’m still working on that last step)
Keep the fingers spread… …even after you ditch the webby gloves. A “claw hand” has more purchase than one cupped with fingers together. This is presuming a palm down white man hand roll. To be Greenlandically correct the layback version is done palm up, and forward finishing palm down.
