I feel your pain
I can paddle roll, hand paddle roll and bare hand roll, but can’t sustain the balance brace. Given the choice, I’d prefer it this way to vice versa.
Why
would you expect applause while your ears are still in the water, covered by neoprene or ear plugs…Silly silly silly…no one applauds until the roll is completed and you are sitting up and can hear it.
This would be a very poor reason to demonstrate a skill
Best Wishes
Roy
OK 
Yeah, Florida is different that way, though not toasty. We have a few folks from up here who have regularly gone to symposiums down there, and both decided dry suits were good for full day sessions in the winter.
I get the part about only doing what appeals. It took my entire adulthood but I am finally better at setting boundaries on my volunteer work.
There are some things that usually are easier for women because we tend to be more flexible and have weight better distributed in the bottom of the boat than guys. If anyone offers to have you mess around in something shamelessly easy like an old Dagger Piedra, you may want to give it a shot on a hot day.
Why The Pause After a Roll?
A few reasons…
- as the first poster said, to take their time make sure their setup is solid before finishing.
- in surf it’s wise to often let the wave release you, then roll up.
- I tried a new kayak last week which was hard to capsize, once over, it felt as stable upside down as being up right side up. it took a little extra effort to right it.
- wave ski’s are often hard to roll. the rider may take time to release their foot and use it as a counter weight while doing a back deck roll.
- enjoy the view!
if it is very difficult…
it’s not much of a tool to learn something else. If it is easy it can make life simpler.
I can understand how frustrating it is to see some folks just lying around on the water able to talk about cloud formations while you are sputtering underneath the surface every second. That said, one thing that I do when I am trying to get back to it, and I see others do, is to be impatient and work it too hard. Tension will kill it, makes you arch all the wrong ways in terms of how your torso and midriff muscles will tighten up.
Now Celia
I should pursue the balance brace so I can admire clouds?
The Pause That Refreshes
It beats working
You Got DAT Right
Pack canoe
I can roll a SOT provided it has thigh straps and I’ve rolled canoes as well;) It’s all about maintaining contact with the boat, body positioning and working the paddle.
Balance brace
Actually, the balance brace is a great way to rest and cool off.
Usually it’s not about bodies as much as it is about your boat. Coaming height and back deck height can be a real limiting factor in success in a balance brace. For instance, in my PH Quest the balance brace takes a lot of focus and works only because I’m rather flexible but in my Valley Anasacuta it’s easy. With the former I can really feel the coaming and I have to bend my body around it but in the Anasacuta the coaming/back deck is low enough to be at the water line and not inhibiting my body fromm being in the appropriate position.
Also …
salt water makes a big difference for me. I can just flop over into a brace in my Avocet in salt water, but often have difficulty doing a balance brace in fresh water. It certainly takes more concentration and paying attention to my position, yet sometimes I still cannot balance brace no matter how hard I work at it.
The question was a pause at the end
no the beginning.
Why not?
Why not? It opens up a whole new dimension.
I can roll a sit on top. 
Gary
pool sessions
I do them all the time. of course its in the back yard so that helps
Any time
you want to roll your Tempest in Lake Maitland, I’ll be happy to take videos. Have you ever rolled in the Econ? Just wondering…
Probably right
As reluctant as I am to fall into the blame-the-boat trap, that might be a factor. Also, I tend to set outfitting super tight and built my SOF the same way. We do weekly pool sessions so I’ll try it with everything loosened up so I can get more over the coaming.
in my case
it was from Kent Ford’s Kayak Roll DVD. Was great help in may ways. Now I strive for smooth, fluid and unhurried movements with no apparent pauses in between.
I also wonder why so many folks still set-up above the water after developing a decent roll.
Yup, boat affects
It is much easier in one of my boats than the other, easiest in the one that is very low around me. The more difficult one also has a side that is less perpendicular to the water than the easier one, the latter of which will sit on its side forever because that’s a natural place for it to rest anyway. The one with the more angled side has to be pushed over further, which means I have to do a little better on how well I rotate over and arch my back.
Sooo - on days when I can’t get that extra rotation, it may not happen in the more difficult boat. It’s just physics. I need more back flat to the water to make that sucker stay away from me than in the other boat.
But none of this matters if someone is built so that the combination of the floatation from the PFD and the flat of their back is challenged to support the weight of their torso. Hence things like wetzool finding it easier in salt water - someone built with virtually no fat will notice the salt water advantage much more than me.
It’s still fun though.
Not blaming the boat
It’s not so much blaming the boat as working within the limitations of the equipment. Boats that are designed along similar lines as Greenland boats have different characteristics than British designs which are different than North American designs etc i.e Northwest Kayaks vs NDK vs a Greenland SOF. There are a lot of different factors in boat fit and design. New paddlers learn this after they get their first boat and start figuring out what they want to do, try other boats and then move in that direction.
One example is competition rolling boats have super low volume which facilitates rolling while racing yaks go very fast and track straight but can be a bear to turn.