Thats an
interesting nuance on using the strokes. Thanks.
It’s interesting…
I am an entirely self-taught paddler. I started paddling a little 12 ft. johnboat on Ozark streams when I was about 13 years old, and didn’t even paddle a canoe until I was about 17. Got my first canoe, a 15 ft. Grumman, the year I graduated from high school. I may have first heard of a J stroke from a book, and maybe a draw as well. Everything else I’ve ever done with a paddle, I’ve done it because it just seemed like it might be a good way to accomplish what I was trying to make the canoe do. And as I read the descriptions and terminology of various strokes here, I recognize a lot of strokes I regularly do…but this was the first time I actually found out they are “formal” strokes, with names even!
All these strokes, as others have said, are for making a paddle craft do slightly different things. For instance, I’m almost always fishing as I paddle, and controlling the canoe in order to fish efficiently while drifting on a river is not only necessary, but different from what you’re usually doing if paddling flatwater, or paddling for speed, or maneuvering in whitewater. And making the boat turn while moving forward, turn while slowing or stopping, turn while at the same time moving sideways, turn using differential currents, move sideways without turning, move sideways while turning slightly…well you get the picture. There is a stroke or a combination of strokes that will accomplish just about any little thing you want the boat to do, and it all becomes a matter of the interaction of your paddle with the water, the current, and your momentum. After nearly 50 years of paddling, it’s all intuitive now.
advanced kayak strokes
or, as Otterslide says, basic canoe strokes…
One way to think about it is to use wind and hydraulic properties to your maximum advantage to move the boat where you want it to go with minimum effort and loss of speed (and I suppose while keeping upright). As pointed out above, there are also considerations of body mechanics - like the cross bow rudder.
Given that, a stroke is going to move the bow, move the stern, both, or in the case of a draw - be able to move the boat sideways without turning it.
My understanding of the why behind different strokes was really helped when it was put together with a description of weather-cocking and lee-cocking. Weather-cocking is a tendency for the boat to turn into the wind, lee-cocking to turn down wind. So if you want to turn into the wind use a stroke by the bow so your paddle “pins the bow” and the stern moves relatively down wind. To turn with the wind, you generally want to do the reverse and pin the stern. Since most kayaks moving forward will tend to weather-cock, it is often harder to turn down wind.
There are a lot of other things that can come into play, but I think that is the most important concept. If you paddle in current, then things like the low brace turn become really useful.
Learn the strokes on calm flat water then play with them in wind and wind+waves. Play with the strokes in tight situations, too. That will help you understand the advantages of each.
hanging draw, bow rudder, stern draw
I teach all three of these in one lesson, because they’re the same stroke, just placed differently. Start by getting students to place a neutral blade angle next to their seat, so the blade just slices along, then rotate your body more towards the blade, and they get a slight draw. Then experiement with moving the blade back just behind the seat, and forward to the knee.
There actually aren’t all that may strokes - there are perhaps a half dozen or so - and then there are dozens of variations and combinations of those basic strokes.
good but not necessary
If you go to a good restaurant chances are that there will be 5 or more utensils on the table. You could eat the meal with any one.
There’s so many overlaps with these techniques that no one is the perfect solution. And they get enhanced with leaning the boat or edging the boat.
As you progress, you learn more and more and often discard the less practical ones and develop an arsenal of techniques that work well for you. The basic stern rudder is the best starting point.