Freestyle Kayaking by Bartosz Czauderna

Small page update

2012-01-22T05:58:00.000-08:00

Hey everybody!

I've added some of missing sponsors logos which are supporting me and finaly updated the Sponsors page, check it out!

I started my pool trainings since begininng of year, so far so good ;) enjoying it pretty much even thought it's very late some days when I have to go early morning for classes next day.

I'm almost done with tests at uni I had to make up, now just 3 main exams are next to me but before it i will spend a week at winter camp from my uni!

Stay in tune!

Uganda

2011-12-29T15:50:00.000-08:00

Arrival at night. After long flight without sleep becouse too much excitment. All the time peaking through the window if it's there already and if i could see anything throught dark sky over dark land. Any lights, could that be Uganda already?

Jumping out of the plane, first impression ? hm. This strange but nice smell in the air... i'd say kind of wood, bamboo might it be?
This air.. so warm but wet, pleasure to breath!

On the board of the airplane.. walking towards the building and looking around.. quite big difference after Warsaw and Istanbul airports. Really small with few planes at it not too much people around.

First visa controls and some paper work excitment mixed with confusment. Passed everything, got my staff back and now what? There should be driver waiting for me but my flight got delayed in istanbul and i couldnt contact him at all... Luckly in Istanbul cafe there was a guy sitting in cafe at wifi who invited me to the table and after short while i knew that he is kayaker also and he is going to Uganda also! That was pretty big surprise for me but i was really glad i met him. We decided to travel together since then so when we left the control we seen alot of people waiting with cards and names on it. First glance and i didnt see mine. But then once again and i noticed it. We left the airport and jumped into Toms car. First thing that hit my mind, why are they driving on the left? but after second i reminded that Uganda was British cologne so it shouldnt surprise me. I was really exhausted after long travel but just couldnt close my eyes being amazed with every single thing i seen. We seen few police cars on sides in Kampala but as Tom had explained they were giving power to different parts of street for specified time! It means some part of street gets i.e power for only 3 hours a day and police is keeping an eye on it. Uganda is having water power stations i.e from jinja and bujagali dam (which destroyed all day 1 rapids) but 70-90% of power is sold to neighbours and just little stays in Uganda.

Even traveling in night i was amazed with surrounding nature everything was different then in my country!
So after arriving to Entebbe and traveling throught Kampala we arrived to Hairy Lemon camping which is located near Nazigo village just after the sunrise which actually had brought us quite beatiful views on the way.

Hairy Lemon proved to be beatiful island which you could get on by jumping into canoe with your staff and crossing one of nile branches. When we arrived the island inhabitants were just waking up and coming to the bar for breakfest.

When i was leaving home i wasnt really sure who will be there in the same time so i was really looking forward to see some friends. I was really happy to see there my good friends from Russia who i met in Kadan and before - Stas, Jar, Andrey, Reka and Ania from Ukraine. Also there were some guys from America and two Finish guys who stayed there long time with us also - Henko and Daabsa.

As i was really starving i was so happy to catch breakfast which was really awesome! Ananas, watermelon, bananas and mangos had so great taste, were super sweet and so juicy! Followed by porridge, eggs and sometimes beacon or sausages and ofcourse fresh bread. I just loved breakfasts there!

Despite the total exhaustion i couldnt just go sleep and i was so keen to go paddling and see the famous Nile Special. I had to be patient for a while as wave was getting good around 11 am i focused on unpacking my staff and setting tent on the hill.

I unpacked my boat and gladly didnt notice any serious damages after flight. After taking all the staff it was about the time to hit the wave! I got a bit surprised as i thought that wave will be just next to island but you had to paddle like 500m upstream in the eddy to get there however it was great warm up everyday!

First impression on my first bigger wave?

-Wow.

I did fell in love really fast although i felt there for few first days as if i were a bag of bones which have been being thrown in air constantly by big wave.

Learning how to control the wave took me few days but throwing some sweet tricks came immedietly after surfing. I figured out that it feels completly different throwing aerial tricks in wave and it's even more awesome!

After first day paddling i slept loads of hours to rest but as fast as i woke up i did head for wave again and again it was just so great! Great thing about being there was chill out zone where we've been spending alot of time resting after great sessions and parties in the evening. first two weeks with Russish friends were one big entertainment!

After few days we went to Jinja and i met with for the first time with most popular type of transport there - Boda Boda which is motorcyle driven by local guy. You can see them everywhere in Uganda riding around or calling you just to give even a smallest lift. So i went there with Stas and it was really scary for me - becouse the roads there are mostly just dirt roads with alot of holes and other vehicles passing really close to each other. Also it's common to meet there herd of cows or alot of people going in group. Everything this adding the speed which boda boda is taking at those places can scare even bravest people. But you are simply getting used to it after few rides as it's really cheap and fast way to travel.

On the way to Jinja you can learn alot about living of local people. Near Hairy Lemon before Nazigo village you can see alot of small villages where house are made of clay and mud based on wooden sticks. Farer you get you can sometimes notice ritch houses made of bricks. You can see people bringing food from jungle,making bricks from clay and mud or working on the field. Sometimes you can see kids playing with ball made of grass or skin filled with it and sewn but it's normal that kids are helping with work, carrying staff on their heads or helping in the field.
But everytime when we - white people - Muzungu (becouse it's how it's called in Luganda - local language) are passing by all the kids are running from houses yelling: Muzungu! Muzungu! How are you! How are you!

Every of them wants to talk with you, they are even running after bodas or cars just to wave to you. If you meet some of kids it's normal that you are being asked : "Give me my t-shirt" - while kid pulls your t shirt or
"Give me my money!" but nothing from those is offensive, they are just looking to get anything that they could as poorness is everywhere there. Thought english is official language there, alot of people in villages far from the bigger cities or places like nile shore dont speak it knowing only words like "how are you" or "what is your name" becouse they dont have too much touch with white people so they just speak Luganda.

As i said the poorness is very common there, each family consists of alot of kids and it's normal that 15 years old girls are getting married and if the women is older then 20 it means she can be too old and she can have problems with finding man, so she should marry black guy - Mudagawa immedietly. Also if she didnt have
kids yet she is offered help from locals always becouse she should be pregnant already as god wants her to be used properly.

According to God, there are few different religions there but main one seems to be christianism and while driving a road you can see on sides christians churches quite often - but not as same as you see in europe, sometimes it's just typical house with extra board and cross in front. There are also muslims, jews, protestants and as there are some people from india - hinduism. You can see them mostly in cities running some business.

Next thing you notice on the way there are schools for all levels from primery to high schools, where you can see alot of kids in uniforms. Unfortunetly thought primary education is said to be free in Uganda, the truth seems to be that the people need to pay for most of staff there.

So as i was saying , we went to Jinja. Jinija is the second large city in Uganda. It's located at shore of Victoria Lake near the source of the White Nile. We were stopping there once a week at 2friends restaurant for eating dinner and catching internet. I was also walking around there quite alot but most of the streets look same. There is main street where are most of the shops with souvenirs - and there are alot of them with loads of handmade staff and paintings. The street finishes with post office where you can send staff but you cannot really buy there postcards or anything like this. Only airtime for phones. As it comes to phones - in Uganda nearly everybody has their mobiles, otherwise you would not exist in the community even thought it's extra cost.

Over Jinja there are big flying birds called Marabuts. You might say they are equivalent for Cracows pigeons but they are alot bigger, havin like 1,5m of height and wide of wings up to 3m! They are eating trashes there and there is really alot of them.

In jinja i met with other common type of transport called "Matatu", it's nothing different then bus but interesting thing about them is that in crew there is driver and manager of it who is responsible for catching people. He is just running around or yelling from car and invinting everybody to drive with them.

You could say that's it's traditional thing to bargain with everybody. For everything , doesnt metter if it's food, souvenire or transport. Even when you manage to set satisfactory price for transport i.e 60 000 UGX, after arrival you are being said it's 90,000 UGX and you gotta bargain from beginning.

Ah i forgot to mention the currency there. Those are ugandian shylings, 2,500 of it is around 1$. So to pay my camping i had take so much cash to i could call myself milionare for some time :)

Great thing always waiting for us at camping were lunches and dinners with oriental self made food. Fresh rolls and great dishes. Unusual thing is eating goats meat nearly all the time! I will never forget the pudding i ate there, were so amazing! Luckly i took some recipes home ;)

So back to the wave, we had pretty big water levels and we didnt need to use the rope which was actually really nice. Thought the wave had quite alot of foam and pulses becouse of it but you didnt flash that much. Really sad thing for me was that i wasn't able to catch the Club wave becouse of high water levels.
But it allowed us to catch, well i could say legendary wave - Malalu.

Malalu is great wave located one hour paddling downstream from the Hairy Lemon. It's really wide and nicely green, paddling at it was such a huge fun and pleasure, just making surfs and carving on this big green was so great. You could go also really big after catching good timing! The only thing you had to take care off was to dont get pushed to right as it was flashy there and not equal so you couldnt really surf back. We were surfing also waves like Dogs hair or Vengine.

Near river bank at Nile Special lies a village and alot of those people which live there you could call wave community members, as kids are spending whole days at wave just looking to paddle in boat, swim in life jacket or even with thruster. They are also looking to get something from you like clothes but also they ask you for job - to help you with camera, carry your boat or bring you some food.

But freestyle is only one part of visit. It's also the river running. Even thought probably the best rapids were gone as day 1 section got flooded becouse of dam that was built there in february - there is still day 2 section which i ran twice, once from kalagala and second time from beggining - Overtime as i was pushing my friends to hit superhole.

So starting from the Overtime, which is pretty easy rapid thought it's said to have nasty slide with rocks and i had to carry it as i had my carbon boat with me. So me & Thomas carried it around while Henko and James (Austrialian guy who arrived in meantime) ran it. We joined them in few moments and headed for superhole. But on the way there we seen really big snake in the water with head bigger then fist and body wide atleast 20cm ! We couldnt see how long it was but we just decided to leave it there and paddle hard to different direction.

Later we arrived to superhole where we spent hour playing. Few words about it - well it surely doesnt deserve it's name but it wasnt that terrible and i was pretty happy to play in hole after riding wave all the time.

After this we headed for next part which was place where you had to pick if you want to run Itanda, Hepoxy or Kalagala. I ran Kalagala falls at my first run - it's 6m high waterfall with huge amount of water falling. Looking scary but it's pretty good fun! Middle one is Hepoxy - which is said to be deadly one maybe not that much of technique but you just go there and it should let you go. Question is after how long time, sometimes it's 10 seconds and sometimes it's 10 minutes, and there are few big holes with this rule.
So we decided to run Intanda which actually i was planning to carry since beggining as i dont really enjoy river running that much and i dont feel too self-confident about it, but we stop before and went to watch it. It is really huge. Biggest thing i ever seen. But after thinking for some time and looking for lines it didnt look really super hard and i just had to give it a try. Our problem was that nobody of us ever seen it before not mentioning running it. But we found line easly and it looked without problems - as we thought. We wanted to start on left from the island then use jump down and kiss the pencil sharpner (which is most dangerous part of it) then run right to avoid cubin and ash tray, we even wanted to surf them on shoulders. Plan seemed great and was pretty easy line. So we picked the order that James is first Henko in middle and me 3rd.

There was one problem. We didnt see the hole behind the island. All of us Fell in it. and got knocked out at different directions. Henko to the right close to island as he only catch it for second and ran away succesfully, i got kick to middle and james to tottal left. I didnt see james anymore but i just seen this drop next to me and big hole down there which henko commented "after running and stopping in eddy i look behind my arm and see this huge pull over hole, i hope nobody fall in" - and then i fall in. I was there pretty long time fighting but water simply took away my paddle and later blocked me from doing even hand rolls so i just pull the skirt. Henko watching it from side said "that was long time, first i seen Bartoszs helmet, then paddle, then boat, but where is Bartosz?" I got out a while after my staff barely concious and Henko fished me from the eddy behind the hole as i was heading to the current leading to pencil sharpner. Well then it was just worse. I rested a bit and in panic i was freaking out as he said to let his boat or we going to get trashed together. I got sober asap and just decide to swim it as Henko was saying that i'm just loosing my strentgh there. I gave him my boots as i had a feeling that they were dragging me down, I catch the paddle and tried to paddle on the current but it was sucking me down all the time so i had to drop it and just was praying to dont fall into sharpner.
Somehow i made it by swimming really hard and had a relief but the nightmare continued. i was facing drop and huge cubin next to me, suddenly i got really smart and decided to dive and just before hitting the foam i dived as well as i could and cought the rocks on the bottom and like a hipo run on the bottom then push myself up hard and somehow made it. But there was the Ash tray next to me and it looked even more huge then previous but i dived again and in hipo style tried to survive this. I got some extra downtime as water didnt let me up for over 40 seconds but on the end i just popped up 50m downstream was completly exhausted and couldnt even get up on the rock to look for equipment but after sometime i made it and we found the paddle, in the meantime - and it was like 10 minutes James managed to fish my boat and helmet which he thought includes me so he took nice sprint to save me.

So i could say i RUN intanda ;) Literaly.
But the most amazing thing is that nothing happened to my boat, seen few scratches but no cracks, and there was so much water everywhere and i hit the rocks few times on the way but nothing happened to the boat ;)

Best summary was from local guy who was there at place we stop after this who said with big smile on his face:

THANK YOU FOR COMING INTANDA :)

Except alot of paddling we were having fire shows with fire chains, zullu swords trainings and drum nights. I can easy say it was the best trip of my life and i had so great time over there! I can recommend it to every paddler as "must be there" place. I learned alot on the wave throwing all the wave tricks but also learned alot about this culture and country. Also met many great people with who i had really great time, thanks guys!

I cant wait to come to Uganda again, I already plan to go there for five months next year after America.

Few more pictures:

What's next?

Now focusing on making movie from Uganda but also training on flatwater until the season is open again. Next stop? Probably Austria or Czech in April,

Stay in Tune!

As always, Thanks for reading

Bartosz

P. S

From Now on I promise to keep on the updates regular again. Spots and locations are coming back to live and i plan to finish few cool plans with blog :)

Uganda Update

2011-11-30T04:54:00.000-08:00

Ah! Been in Uganda over week now. How awesome and beatiful it is - hard to describe! at every step i'm meeting something that amazes me. Hairy Lemon is a paradise island where i could spend atleast half of year. But the best thing about it is that it's only 10 minutes paddling from Nile Special which is so awesome wave! Now we are having really high water levels so we dont need rope to get on and we can surf there pretty long time throwing some huge aerial tricks. It's hard to say how awesome feeling is to surf this wave at warm sunset and chill with friends on island later.

The rain season hasn't finished yet here so sometimes we are having showers and it's getting super cold! (like about 20 degrees ) But hopefully soon it will be only those sweet sunny days.

Few days ago unfortunetly i've broken my paddle so gotta be borrowing one from friends. Tomorrow heading to kalagala falls and going to run whole river, cant wait for that!

Unfortunetly the internet here is really slow so uploading any pictures is super hard. That's why you gotta patiently wait for them until i get back!

Cheers,

B

Plzen Video from Pirate Production

2011-10-14T01:47:00.000-07:00

Didn't write for quite long time. Since i got back home i'm dealing with exams at uni, but hopefully will finish it soon and come back to regular updates - my season is not finished yet ;)! Thought missing the Sluice Rodeo in Ireland this weekend, still planing to hit plattling before Uganda!

And to the topic. Here is awesome video from Pirate-Production made in co. with Rise Up (http://riseup.cz/). If you need any movies - hit to this guys, this is what they make!

http://vimeo.com/30508342

Check it out!

You can find relation form the competition here:

http://bartoszfreestylekayaker.blogspot.com/2011/09/arf-cup-plzen.html

Cheers,

Bartosz

Final of the ARF Cup! Cunovo!

2011-09-30T03:39:00.000-07:00

Last weekend of the trip. Cunovo. Final of the Alpine Rivers Freestyle Cup.

We arrived with Bubaks at thursday to Bratislava and stop at boathouse where we had small grill party with Slovakian crew. Was nice to see all of them again but we didn't stay on that long as i had to pick up my Polish friend - Adam, who came from Warsaw at 6 am! I have no idea how but i managed to get up early enough to pick him and as we were back really fast thanks to kindness of Peter who woke up specialy for me at 7 to repair the Cow !

So after all season my boat was looking really bad with lost tapes, bad scratches and carbon bruises. Thought even it looked that bad it still wasn't leaking ! Amazing how well made is that boat! Even more wonderful thing is that after 2.5h of work on it it looks again nearly as brand new! Now just a bit of autolack and i can say it's new !

Later on we moved to Cunovo to set the camp and as my boat was still drying i took some time chilling around and watching guys paddling. At the evening i went for short session as i still had in mind my arms injuries. It gave me dozens of fun as i didn't paddle for week which felt like ages! Couldn't focus on training any tricks just simple eskimo rolls were fun enough! In the time my Mom & Artek came and i jumped out of the water as i didn't see since Worlds! Was really happy to see them again.

In the evening we had camp-round party where Honza Havelka and me had made small fireshow which unfortunetly costed me a bit of hairs and burned chicken parts again thought as always was so fun!

Next day was starting with fun slalom race but unfortunetly I overslept and woke up after it. So next thing to attend for me was K1M prelims where i finished 3rd after Tomo and Peter and after that there was C1 where i came 5th granting me finals. In the afternon there was time for semifinals which were really amaing as alot great paddlers qulificated and everybody could get to finals, no random shots. After hard play to final five came Petr Prause, Marcel Bloder, Me, Tomo and Peter.

In the evening there was concert with nice band and tombola. Unfortunetly when the great concert finished there was nothing else planned and the party went down which was such a shame as it was going on really nice.

Sunday morning was starting with kayak cross on second channel where was great slide, unfortunatly well... overslept again! I'm a bit lazy to weak up that early ;).
Straight after cross it was time for the finals, C1 and K1m were 2 last so i had time to prepare, couldn't wait for C1 as it's giving me so many fun now it's a bit different and i see there challenge again for all the tricks! Thought in finals managed only loop and some wheel which gave me 4th place in K1M after final full of emotion we had huge suprise. Tomo won with Peter - who came second! I was 3rd followed by Marcel and Pepe.

As it was final event of Alpine Rivers Freestyle Cup we got the scores, I won it in K1M and Honza Spindler was second and also i came 2nd in C1 which is big achievment also ! I would like to say thanks for all the organisators of cunovo and whole Alpine Cup for great times and fun also thanks to all the people that participated for all the parties and chilling times.

Photos: Haninka & Adam

Gold at Polish Championships!

2011-09-22T06:51:00.000-07:00

So after Plzen my plan was to go straight to Poland to prepare for Polish Championships in Jelenia Góra. Thought from long time spot was already shown to be ready it was said that it’s impossible to train until Tuesday before competition. Also I still had my arm damaged so i decided to take few days of paddling stopping in Prague at Stepans place. At Monday did some sightseeing with Haninka, Nina and Csony thought becouse of bad weather after some time we finished up in Boulder v Siti.

Next days which were supposed to be rest from paddling were pretty exciting also, went for horse riding which was exciting alot becouse the horse decided to add some extra speed boost in middle of forest and was quite big challenge but at the end it finished without any problems. Later went for acrobatic gymnastic classes which were really awesome as it was proffesional acrobatic circus members doing really increadible things on scarfs. Also good thing was going for climbing at boulder but was quite exhausting for my arms.

After 3 days of rest got back to paddling and my cow got close meet with prague course making smashed nose at wave and tlama hole. Thought it didn’t stop me from paddling especially becouse Stepan gave me really good tips with Air Screw at this small wave and it worked so good! Was great feeling throwing big air jumps with cow at such small wave!

Tlama was getting more and more friendly for me however it is very trashy hole but that’s what i loved about paddling here in prague, good warm up at flatwater then nice chilling at wave then getting completly trashed and exhausted in hole .

At Sunday i went with Ondra Krivanek and Lucas Cervinka to Poland as playspot in Jelenia Góra was supposed to be still not functioning we headed to Lwówek Śląski which is located only 50 km from there. There joined to us crew from Warsaw which was also preparing for Polish competition. The hole was completly different then all that i paddled at – it was super fast but after setting it and getting used to it was allowing you for to get some sick aerial moves.

Finaly at Tuesday we went for first official trainings and found the spot prepared quite nice. Thought it was completly opposite to previous one – it was really slow and requiered using lots of strength to throw the tricks. It was awesome place for training and practicing but it didn’t give that much fun from paddling. I was training hard for next days finding it really funny place for combos.

At Friday everybody was there and i was really happy to see my Czech friends again. They came in quite big crew for Polish competitions consisting of Ondra,Bubac, Milos, Slunda and Lucas along with Simona and Haninka. Even thought the party wasn’t planned for Friday, we had our own mind about this and spend really great evening at camping place listening to stories about crazy deers from Slunda.

Saturday was first day of competition and the plan in the schedule was to make only mens prelims. I was starting in first heat but it didn’t put any effect at me, i made really soft ride getting 770 points but it was satisfactioning enough giving me sure place in the finals which was the reason i decided to go for combos in second one. Started with Tricky Moo to MoocNasty and then tried phoenix to lunar orbit which almost worked! Was so proud of it! Surprisingly those two rides gave me first place after prelims. Tomasz Czaplicki and Michal Wrzal took next ones followed by Ondra and Slunda.

There were also one ride runs for everybody from other categories to set the order for finals. When starts had finished we took a walk around the city discovering that it has really beatiful center! We were really amazed of it but didn’t spend too much time there as we wanted to get back to camping for Jet Big Air contest! There was a Jet with a rope giving sweet acceleration and allowing to do huge aerial moves but also face slams if you didn’t count your jump well. That was really sick fun which after with Bubac and Haninka we borrowed a normal small paddleboat and went for lake paddling getting to dam and getting some chill there with Jet riding near us from time to time and Bubac yodeling. When we get back the party was already going on so we just joined our friends and partied hard!

At Sunday were the finals. Tomasz had best first ride getting 680 points. I needed some time to get my one, throwing 173 points in first, 548 in second and getting highest one to 700 points and getting tittle of Polish Freestyle Champion. Second came Tomasz and 3rd was Michal. Slunda came 4th and Ondra 5th.

Whole competitions were organised quite precisly without delays and nice thing was free food and drinks for competitors althought it’s still shame that there were so few people from Poland and the atmosphere wasn’t that loose. Thought all in al lit was quite nice weekend with lot of fun as always with kayaking : )

Now got back to Prague again for last time in this season taking some rest and then going with bubaks at Thursday to Cunovo for last competitions of Alpine Rivers Freestyle Cup! See You There!

~Bartosz

Here are great photos from Haninka and Pepe!

ARF Cup Plzen!

2011-09-07T03:25:00.000-07:00

I arrived to Plzen straight after Lipno at Sunday with Fidus, Iv and Richi. Waiting for Honzas arrival, thanks to their kindness i stayed at their place. In Monday I had two really long and hard sessions becouse most of time i was alone and paddling without brake but i've found the playspot really nice. I've been working on Tricky Moos to MoocNastys on both sides which was big challenge for me but it seemed to work from time to time!

At Tuesday Honza has arrived and as Lucie has passed her exam for Magister degree (Congratz again !) we were celebrating it. Around midnight we decided to look for party in city as Plzen is quite big, we expected to find something. Locals led us to "natural club" but unfortunetly there weren't any people so we just enjoyed spending time with ourselves.

Wednesday was really awesome day long session! Stepan and Vilda came from Prague to train, also already alot of Plzen people came for training. We were paddling whole day and spend like half of this time in the air! Was really awesome staying and cheering for friends throwing some sick and fun stuff! Honza and Stepan were flying in their ZET boats really high while i enjoyed making TrickyMoo to MoocNasty to both sides! Cow got pilot license for phoenix monkeys also! Unfortunetly at evening they had to leave but we didn't miss people for long time as most of them arrived at friday noon and just few hours later party has started! First day was great concert from Visaci zamek revival. Unfortunetly dancing in pogo i got really hard elbow knockout at my trapez muscle which brought me really bad arm injury.. At saturday paddling straight and making eskimo rolls were really painfull and all right moves were just impossible. Thought i've found making left ones pretty unharming which allowed me to finish at 3rd place after qualifications with Honza on second place, Stepan 7th - which was biggest suprise of qualifications as he was riding sick rides before, Bubak 8th and Ondra 9th and as most of time Peter Csonka was on the lead. We were happy as all pirates has proceed to semi.

Semi were same day in the afternoon. And there looked exactly as they should have had. Everybody were throwing loads of highscored, huge and perfect tricks making way to final really tight and hard. On the end from the 5th place came Honza, 4th was Tomo, i've defended my 3rd place, Stepan jumped to second as expected and Peter stayed still on the lead.

After awesome semifinals it was time for the party, which before we decided to jump to see the city for fast sightseeing, Plzen is really nice but quite small and we had party hunger so we were back really fast. We been partying to 4 in the morning dancing all the time and having hips of fun. But the party winners were definetly Ondra and Milos which made great dancing shows for all night!

Great idea from organisators was the Kayak Cross in the morning which came before finals at 11, which let everybody to take some sleep and rest. That was pretty fun event proving that you can make it even in place without any extra boulders.
After this it was time of finals - and as Honza, Stepan and Me were judging all day before, we had to do our job at sunday also. We just got switched at C1 category so we had time for preparing for K1M.

K1M was huge entertainment. I guess the biggest surprise was Tomo with his sick rides! He made dozens of tricks and some people event thought he could get Peter! I was not in shape with my arm yet which annoyed me a bit but still allowed me to throw some good score and i was really glad for making my combo. Great air rides had also Honza and Stepan throwing air paradise for viewers. Great thing for me was also all public making MOOO before my ride, was really fun to see everybody into it!That's good way to cheer the Cow ;).

Finally Peter won,Tomo came second and me 3rd. Honza took 4th place and Stepan 5th, but it was really great to paddle with all of you guys, thanks!

As Plzen was also last event of CNAWR cup we got the final scores. Deserved winner in K1M was Honza, with me on second place and Marcel at 3rd.
After Plzen I'm proud to still be leader of Alpine Cup. Now few days in Prague and going to Poland for preparing for Polish championships and after that straight to Cunovo for last event of Alpine Cup!

Stay in Tune!~

Some Photos ;)

Lipno Devils Extreme Race! - My first Creeking descent!

2011-09-01T05:57:00.000-07:00

On last weekend of August - 27-28 as every year, the Dam at Veltava river has realeased the water. I went there with Stepan Vohradsky and his parents, we have left Prauge at thursday evening so at Friday we were ready for paddling.

I've borrowed Dagger Mamba from Vodak sport and after some morning swimming in lake over the river we went for paddling. Honestly i was a bit scared as i didn't know what to expect and felt uncomfortable in creek.

First run was at not maximum water level yet, so it was a bit different. The upper part of river was really easy consisting just of some small waves. The thing about the river was that it smelled really badly so i really didn't want to make rolls. After upper part there were two small lakes leading to first harder place named "papiernia", looked pretty scary for me but went really smooth, there was nice small wave for playboating thought. It led us straight to "Wrota" (Gate) which i seen at some clips before, We went to scout it as water level wasn't normal - for me it looked really scary but Stepan claimed that it's easy so following his advice i just ran it. Was really great experience thought the water sucked my boat down and only my head was over the water but finally i made it without getting wet head and gate become my favorite part which brings alot of fun. After that there was "Szkwira" place called also Bloody Fingers Section. It was just nasty rapid which we decided to carry thought from down i was comitted to run it next time until i seen Jakub Valenta and Jakub Nemec running it and both getting smashed on rocks with blood fingers result, that has changed my attitude and i didn't want to try it anymore. After this there were few fun places leading to "schody" - stairs. Which was said to be technique place and which sounded a bit scary for me after hearing the description and line to make there were few jumps but not every one was safe. But as i was following Stepan i made it without any problems.All in all i made runs without getting wet even with some great kickflips we throw with stephan on the way - Mamba works great for it! Friday evening was time of huge party with loads of people i was really amazed about amount of them but it was still nothing comparing to what i was going to see next day!

Saturday was day of main race which i attendent for fun also. It was slalom run taking place on papiernia part where you were supposed to touch banners on your way. As i had far starting number i was close to the end but i was too lazy to go and check places of banners and as i wasn't really sure were papiernia starts and ends so it was a bit blind run. Only thing i knew was that i should keep on left to catch small eddy there. When time of my ran came i did -the only one in race- entry kickflip. Then good timing at first 3 banners and straight to papiernia. I seen columns on the way so i know it should be somewhere here. And then on the far end i seen the tent so i was sure the banners are there unfortunetly there was finish! While taking fast run i entered the hole noticing too late that it is THIS hole and missing banner on the left. Tried to catch eddy again and lift myself up for them but it just didn't work so forgetting about right banner which was actually under range of my hand i just went to finish. Came second from end but anyway that was good fun !

The most amazing thing for me was amount of kayakers. I can easly say there were hundreds if not more of them! You could see them everywhere even on the race part! The best thing was that i met my cousins and alot of friends from Poland which made me really happy and actually i figured out that i miss home alot. It has been 4 months now since i left.. But only one more and I will be back!

After four runs of the river we were really tired and went to the camp already preparing for party. Unfortunetly the weather didn't cooperate brining big rain (which luckly finished in the evening but left big mud) and really cold temperature. But it didn't stop people for brining great party!

On sunday I jumped into Stephans boat - one size bigger mamba which felt alot easier and as i felt self-confident i decided to run szkwira part. It went really smooth, i got clean line and almost didn't need to paddle. But i knew that i was lucky - the good line there dependent on pulse of the water and i just got it - alot better kayakers were less lucky.
Good time for me was when we switched with Stepan and i jumped into his all star! That was nice free running with alot of wavewheels, McWaves and kickflips. But still best time i had when we ran the parts with our friends Jan Bubnik, Milos and Tomas Pospisil, picking all different lines and making fun on every places.

All in all it was really great weekend for me with loads of fun and great kayaking. I'm really glad that i went for it and did this runs with friends - kayaking is just awesome in any form! Special thanks for Stepan for babysiting me at water and taking me there!

Now straight to Plzno for Alpine Rivers Cup!

Prague Freestyle Fest!

2011-08-29T08:39:00.000-07:00

At 20-21 of August we’ve been at Freestyle Fest in Prague. Which was really awesome, great organisted event! But lets start from the begining. After tidying everything in Sopac, Honza and Me left to train for contest at Tuesday evening. Ondra becouse of job had to join us at Thursday.

Honza, Marcel and Me visited Stepan Vohradsky in Boulder v Siti – great bar with boulder inside and good atmosphere which is supporting us Pirates. Ondra and Bubak mafia has joined us and as it was Hankas name-day, we went for party to the Cross Club having great fun together.

Next days were pretty busy as we were doing our best to help Stepan to organise the whole event which made all of us very tired becouse the only break between work were hard trainings in hole which was making everybody really tired after even one run.

As about the hole. We had different experiences about the hole, on first two days Honza had been very happy with it throwing really sick rides while for me it had worked horrible allowing to do me around 5 tricks in two days. In next days water been raising and it wasn’t that trashy anymore, but you could go super high what Ondra used to do with his sick air moves. Saturday prelims went pretty fast becouse of really short Eddy and bubbles which were pulsing really hard making some evil flushes. For us – Pirates it went pretty satisfacting throwing all of us to semifinals, Ondra from 7th place, Honza from 4th and I from 1st.

After this there has been Slopestyle European Championships World Premier, which was awesome event! Consisted of four parts in a single run – You were starting at ramp which led you straight to water giving big speed and nice bounce on the water to throw sick wave moves. You could see huge Pan Ams from Jan Liska, Helixes from Marcel and massive air screws from Stepan ! Then next stop was at the wave - you had 20 seconds there to throw all the moves you can! But you had to watch for flush becouse if you get it you are not allowed to come back! Next stop was V-hole with same time rules as wave. It was really fun to try anything there. Last stop was the hole were the competition had been. You could do all moves you wanted in every place and the sum on the end counted. Overall winner was Marcel Bloder!

After this sweet event it was semifinals time. And all 3 Pirates have qualificated for final from top places! Ondra 3rd, Honza 2nd and I defended my 1st place.Following us was Marcel from 4th and Jirka Langer from 5th place.

That was time to relief and for huge party! With great concert of band, beatiful fireshow given by Maja and crew, which Honza Havelka and me joined later, followed by big party with DJs. which closed with DJ Baltazar at 5 in the morning!

Next day was really hot but it didn’t prevent public to come for the show! Water level has dropped quite much since previous day making the hole trashy and closed again which gave us beatiful final! All of mens were throwing huge tricks but judges appreciated ones from pirates mostly! The gold went to Honza Spindler, followed by me with silver and Marcel with bronze. Unfortunetly for Ondra he missed it just a bit and came 4th. 5th place has stayed with Jirka.

That was really great event and great time with loads of public and friends! Big thanks from our hands go to Stepan for organising everything!

Next weekend - Lipno Devils extreme race!

Photos:

Petr Prause, Jirka Vohradsky, Ondrej Kosatka

Sopac Sumer Fest!

2011-08-23T12:29:00.000-07:00

We arrived to Sopac with Honza and Lucie week before event has started. Sopac is place where is located motor playspot made of two tatra engines from boat which are pushing the water in pool through platform making great big hole.

We moved there with „Spindlahouse” – big camper we lived in. We had alot of work becouse Honza was main organisator of this competition and we had alot of work to do to prepare everything. I even participated in repairing of tank – the symbol of sopac which provides great soundsystem for whole party and competitions.
We’ve been having very intensive training sessions once per day becouse of expenses of training there and preparing everything. Thought whole work we did put in had result in the best competition i have ever been at! There were loads of people – not only paddlers which made great atmosphere! You could say party lasted all weekend or even since Wednesday when our friends from Slovakia – Peter, Nina, Capko and Matej came. We’ve had awesome time there!
The competition started on Saturday with mens prelims going first which after i came 3rd behind Honza and Peter on the lead. After this we had awesome World Championships in Slopestyle., after quite good rail ride i had really huge air screw with perfect landing which pushed me to final where i took the risc and wanted to make paddle grind making push up on rail with paddle and back panam on ramp, both didn’t work so the bottle of rum ran near my nose, but it was great fun to compete in it!. In semifinalas which were in afternoon I did alot better throwing some big moves and taking the lead. After semi it was ZET boat contest, with huge prize – new carbon boat from ZET. You had to swim through the pool towards the hole with motors turned on and catch the bottles which were jumping in the foam. The lucky winner was Peter Pepe Prause.

Sunday was – typicaly for Czech – day of the finals. We had different amount of water coming and it got really flashy making it really hard to stick anything. It was really tight game but on the end winner was Peter just a bit after Honza and i took the bronze.

Those were the best competition ever for me, great atmosphere, party and dozens of fun, thanks for organisators, competitors and all other people to came just to watch!

After tidying everything in Sopac I’m going to Prague for Troja Fest!

Heliwelle, Wildalpen, Austria

2011-08-16T05:31:00.000-07:00

Heliwelle is most of the time hole working probably whole year. It's located in beatiful city in middle of Alps - Wildalpen, in Austria

134cm at 4-paddlers.com Pegel, is the lowest level i met there and it's still working as quite weak and shallow hole. You can make there all hole moves but at this water you can hit even with cartwheele, and landings. Launching a loop will cost you double rock bonus ;)

It's quite hard to say the best water level there, but at 140-150cm it allows you to do all tricks without hitting the bottom.

232cm was the highest water level i met, and it was small wave. Not giving too much accelerationg and without bouncing possibility but with nice foam pillow and quite poor shoulders, actually only right one was useful, thought I'm pretty sure at higher water - it would be really nice wave.

It is worth to mention that at this water level there is one more down the course there is one more wave which is pretty small also but alot more powerful, giving quite big bounces but no acceleration keeping you in the front where is almost no green to surf becouse of strong pillow. I guess it has to be more water for both of them to be good.

One more thing about high water - locals said that at 250 you can find really good big waves on Salza down from Fachwerk to Palfau.

Here is link video from Wildalpen made by Pirate-production.cz

Wildalpen 2011

Check it out!

Kayak Channel, Tacen, Slovenia

2011-08-03T08:45:00.001-07:00

Slalom White-water Stadium Tacen – Slovenia (near the capital Ljubljana)
Length: 150m;
Difficulty level: III/IV

This is really nice kayak channel, starting with nice drop with massive water giving you alot of fun just at beggining.

Generally course has two playspots - one is upper hole which at normal water level is very shallow i even managed to make there phoenix monkey with tripple rock bonus! You can hit at initiation, finish of pirouette and landing, which hurts a bit. It has good eddy on left side and right shoulder pushing you to middle, hole is not orthogonal to the mainflow which makes it a bit rough and hard to set up. At higher water it gets quite flushy.

And the second playspot - which is wave/hole or wave depends on water level. On the maximum water level you can get there really nice wave which is perfect for fun, but unfortunatly it's super hard to use eddies on the sides after you flush.

When the water is normal/over normal then it's a wave/hole which can be sometimes a bit shallow but advantage of it is that you can use both eddies. It's pretty good for playing.

Tacen is surely worthly place to visit, thought the best fun you can get when it's maximum water, and in my opinion normal water is a bit too low so look for higher water and pack your equipment!

2011-07-27T09:48:00.000-07:00

One full week of rain. Few days ago I run my first big river - Enns. Which is class IV/V. I run it in wavesport ZG and was quite scary for me in some moments but it was so much fun! Thought i still prefer playboating :D

Becouse of rains salza gone sick - jumped to 230cm! Heliwave become quite nice wave now despite the fact it doesn't give too much bounce and there is almost no eddy so paddling back after flush is really exhausting. But i think

Yesterday i had my birthday and we had really nice party!

Today water dropped and we had really nice hole for getting some sweet aerial moves, hopes this level will last long!

In one week I'm going with Honza and Lucie to Sopotnice in Czech to prepare for competition which will be at 13-14.08,

See Ya there!

B

Kadan Video Clip

2011-07-18T04:44:00.000-07:00

Short Video Clip from competition of CNAWR cup in Kadan - Czech Republic

You can find info and relation from the competition under this link:

http://bartoszfreestylekayaker.blogspot.com/2011_05_01_archive.html

Right now I'm still in Wildalpen with my friends - Honza and Lucie, working as kayak and raft instructor.
I'm here since almost 2 weeks now but every day I'm impressed with beatifulness of the landscape as much as the first time!

More Clips coming soon,

~B

Wildalpen

2011-07-12T04:06:00.000-07:00

At wednesday evening Marcel and me arrived to Wildalpen where we met our friends Honza, Lucy, Lucas and Katya staying already. It was pretty nice weather and after checking forecast we were really optimistic becouse of alot of sun coming. Unfortunatly the weather here is very whimsical and changing as it wants. We had some nice training session between showers and sun.

Saturday was competition day again. We had pretty lots of nations - even Seth from GB was here also German guys, alot of Austrians and Czech. I was starting again in two categories - K1M and C1 which gave me 12 runs ! That was exhausting alot but had alot better condition then in Lienz.

After prelims was holding 4th position behind Marcel Bloder, Philip Vorbohle and Honza Spindler. At C1 i was at 4th place.

In semis i had sick ride which got scored 1085pts! Which gave me 1st place, Honza was second having 530 pts ! 3rd place was for Marcel, 4th Ondrej Krivanek , 5th Moritz Schneck.

Finals didn't work that good for me.. I had even better 2nd ride then in semi but unfortunatly most of moves were after the time and there wasn't any watch so i didn't notice that the time is out and kept throwing trick after trick.. Well finally Finished up second behind Honza, Ondrej was 3rd, Marcel 4th and Moritz 5th.
Thought I'm still on the lead of ARFC : ) In C1 i came 5th.

After competition there was big party with really awesome band playing on everything that was possible - from our paddles, among pots and boats to medals and benches. Had really great time with lots of friends partying to late hours with accompaniment of Aara band.

So what's next? Now i decided to stay here and work for 3 weeks as kayak and raft guide. I'm really glad that Honza and Lucy are staying with me also so I won't be alone at my trainings and overall. I'm sure we'll have here awesome time together! So anybody that's looking for nice freestyle sessions or some great fun just join us at wildalpen!

Photos: Hanka Bubnikova & Seth Ashworth

TRAILER OF FEAR!

http://vimeo.com/26324531

Tacen & Plattling Gallery!!

2011-07-05T07:46:00.000-07:00

It was my first time in Slovenia and I must say that this is really beatiful country with such nice landscapes and views! It was even better becouse Tacen Extreme 2011 was awesome! Quite small competition but really hips of fun !

I even had my first time in creek boat! I gotta say that it's pretty hard to freestyle in it but it's alot of fun also! However I'd prefer staying with my playboating ;). We've been also testing various levels of water and gotta say that at maximum level you can get really nice wave there which gives you alot of fun!

So the competition last 2 days and I was busy very much becouse I was asked to be speaker! I enjoyed it alot but it was quite exhausting and without help from Honza Spindler wouldn't make it, thanks buddy!

At Saturday there rodeo competition had place. It was first time that they were able to hold the competition in lower playspot. They picked medium water level for that which in my opinion was the best! You could do all hole tricks and still some wave which made big fan of tricks bringing on nice entertainment!

Again i decided to compete in two categories K1 and C1. After prelims in K1 was second behind Honza and next to Marcel Bloder and in C1 was at the lead! Becouse there weren't alot competitors it came up fast to finals.
I had really nice ride in K1 and was pretty sure to get gold this time unfortunatly i lost 5 points to Honza! But it wasn't that hard to carry it becouse I'm happy for my friend.
In C1 had even "worse" story! I had same amount of points in best ride as Jonas Savšek ! In that situation rules are counting also second ride and mine was lower. Still getting that high in C1 and bringing two silver medals is the score that I'm satisfactioned with!

So thank you guys for really nice time and really nice competition! Special thanks to main organisator - Jonas! I'm looking forward for next years competition in Tacen!

Next stop on my trip will be wildalpen at this weekend so see ya there!

And at last here are some shoots from Plattling and Tacen!

Authors: Various

Worlds.

2011-07-01T10:27:00.000-07:00

20-26 of june World Championships in Freestyle Kayaking had place. Monday was day of opening ceremony with athletes parade. Next day me and my teammates - Tomasz Czaplicki and Michal Wrzal had start at Squirt category. It was first time that you could start at surface boats becouse the rules had been changed so there were no boat specifications except safety requirements. It was pretty big chalenge for us becouse most of moves were different and we couldn't do mystery moves, thought we were able to bring some trophy. So we came up with idea of making flatwater Phoenix Monkey and McNasty. Thanks to this and some other flatwater moves Tomasz and me got into semi and Michal came 12th.
Wednesday was day of K1M prelims. I was so angry when i figured out that I'm at first heat at 9am! I'm really sleepyhead and it's hard to get up earlier for me so you can imagine my frustration when becouse of water alarm - hard rains forecast - whole schedule got moved and they put as much categories at one day as they could which has result at moving whole category 2 hours earlier which meant for me starting at 7am! That was nightmare. Anyway, somehow I managed to do that after going sleep really early and setting my alarms from 5am. The only thing that was cheering me up was that I was in one heat with one of my best friends - Thomas Dunphy from Ireland. I was even more relaxed thanks to really big crowd which gathered at 7am just for cheering! Thanks guys for making it that early! So after being given nice motivation and taking focus it came to my ride, which was almost perfect! However judges didn't think that. I made McNasty, 2 Phoenix Monkeys loop and 2 helixes and got scored only 450! which means they didn't count any of my phoenix thought they said at captains meeting that it'll be enough to pull it at 45 degrees at half only that's why i didn't look for vertical ones that much.. anyway, here is my ride, you can judge yourself.

gotta find my ride.

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/15539311

At second ride i got flushed unfortunatly, and did only 2 phoenix, loop and mc nasty and that was a nail to my coffin becouse this ride got scored only 250.. still i was pretty sure it will be much more.

gotta find my ride.

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/15539398

The thing is i wasn't the only one thinking that my rides were really good, my teammates and alot of other kayakers said it was blast which would surely shoot me at top 10. But the judges had different opinion about it. Getting 706,667 on the end made me 29th, just 4 places and JUST 40 points behind quarters.

I kept complaining about judges quite badly until i was timer at man quarters, which let me sit just beside Joey - one of the judges. At begining i thought he was really cruel at judging - and that's what i've told to him but he gave me quite satisfacting and good answer - I'm not cruel, I'm good. If we would count this moves which weren't made perfectly there would be no difference at scores. Which was actually shoot to ten. After getting their point of view i started to look at all the moves really strict - the way i was doing before "the english way". It was funny to discover that in over 95% of scoreing i would do same as him.

But still i think my rides got maybe a bit underjudged. Moves weren't perfect, but were followed by rules and i think it might be becouse of first heat - super high shaft which with time went a bit down which i could notice in later rides of some people.

So after getting knocked out I was pretty dissapointed but only for a while. Got focused really fast on next day start and after this on next competition, thought sense of sad still left somewhere deep.

At thursday we had Squirt Semifinals and unfortunatly both Tomasz and me got knocked out.. He came 7th and I came 9th. Seems that beating mystery move is not possible with normal boat but it was alot of fun anyway and well, quite big achievement getting that far in different boat.

Except competitor view i spent awesome time, meeting even more new people, partying with everybody and having fun together. It was so nice feeling that getting from our tent to playspot was taking me so long becouse there was always somebody to have some words with! Got even called few times as 'walking entertainment' ;).

I will be missing all of this staff so badly.. Living in plattling for so long time with so many great people from different places with their own stories and always something to do together. Thank you everybody for this awesome time i could spend with you!

Now I'm in Tacen at awesome kayak course. It's said to be class of WW III/IV and some places are really nice. I had even my first creeker ride ever! But i will stay with playboating - alot more fun ; ). Unfortunatly holes here are pretty shallow, on first day i made phoenix monkey with triple rock bonus ;) one hit at initiation then second with jump to loop and third when i was landing. My cowwy got few more scratches so it got duck tape protection now. Today morning they were adjusting water level from maximum - which was pretty nice wave but without almost eddy to medium - which is the best i think and will stay for competition which are tomorrow.

Stay in Touch!

Bartosz

Squirting and Water Alarm!

2011-06-21T12:31:00.000-07:00

Wooho, I made it to finals in squirts! I came 9th with 618 points and Thomas came 5th with 876 points! Which means we got 2 Polish representants in Squirt Semifinals! That's really good score, we are looking forward for next round!

Unfortunatly there might be huge problem becouse of weathercast... It's predicted to be 300cm ! which means it's going to be flood...

I spent all day complaining that i'm at first heat and i have to start at 9 am! But now my start got moved to 7 am! I have no idea how I'm going to wake up for this..

Well i guess it's time to go sleep then. Wish me good luck!

~B

Day of Opening.

2011-06-20T07:39:00.000-07:00

Today is day of opening ceremony.
We kept complaining about low water for past months and now we got really high one which started to be similiar to wave.. From my really good rides before, there is not much left. But still it works a bit. Tomorrow we got start at squirts, wednesday is men class. Stay in tune ;)

Worlds.

2011-06-16T12:31:00.000-07:00

Only few days left till opening.

Official trainings are begininng tomorrow.

Nearly everybody's here.

Loads of kayakers, loads of good tricks loads and lots of fun with huge queuee.

I'm training in night at last free training times which is making me pretty tired but gives me strong kick of motivation every morning.

The time is close I didn't ever bother with questions or stagefear. Now it comes to me sometimes - Will i be good enough? Pressure maybe showing up? I don't think so, i know i can enjoy it just as it is just my ambitions are sometimes jumping but I know I will do my best and take as much fun of it as i can, that's why I'm here ;)

Level gets super low again....

Cheers, Bartosz ;)

Lienz

2011-06-06T11:37:00.001-07:00

Hallo!

We left on wednesday from Plattling to Lienz! With Van team consisting of Adam Ramadam, Bren Orton, Thomas Dunphy, Martin Koll, Sam Ward and me! We had a stop in Monachium where we picked up our last member - Hannes and stop for short.. lets say a bit longer then we planned at beginning. We had some awesome party time in Monachium which will for sure stay in our memories for long long time! We continued our journey Thursday morning we continued our journey. We got to Lienz where we met already Capko and some German friends. Despite our tiredness we jumped on the water which was so cold giving headache with every roll! On friday almost everybody was there also as rest of our friends from plattling - Orky , Barry and Gerd!

I decided to start in C1 category also! But becouse of lack of paddlers and rules which didn't allow to swap boats between paddlers we prepared Thomases Kayak for my c1 start! We put some foam to seat on so i could knee at seat and some straps that were holding me, looked really sick but it worked! Despite few big bruises but it was so fun!

So it started with k1 eliminations, which after i came 2nd after Gerd, Thomas was 3rd, Peter 4th and Martin 6th. After that i had break for one category and then c1 prelims came. I made loop and came at 3rd place! Was so happy! Then little break again and semifinals time, which after Gerd was 1st, Me 2nd, Peter 3rd, Martin 4th and Honza Spindler 5th. Unfortunetly Thom dropped at 6th place, but still we had awesome crew for finals. But before K1 i had C1 finals. I was already tired and after one of my straps gone tried to roll like 6 times and got flushed downstream 300m and had to run back for next starts. I finished up at 4th place in C1 which gave me alot of fun but after this i was so tired. Just one category break and it was K1M finals time. I really wanted to do my best but it was simply too much of starts for me this day and it was notice able in my paddling. I thought my 3rd run might be top one, but my moves finished mostly sideways. So final result was Peter Csonka 1st, Gerd Serrasolses 2nd, Martin Koll 3rd, Me 4th and Honza Spindler 5th. It was awesome final with some huge runs in there! After that we had really nice meal and party after that! That was really nice trip !

On sunday morning we went back to our camp in plattling where we met alot of new people who came for training! Now after very sunny day it started to rain again and forecast says that there will be some huge showers which might give us really big water level!

Stay in Tune!

Bartosz

Raaain.

2011-06-01T08:03:00.000-07:00

Today after big rain the waterlevel gone huge! Just one night of raining made the water go from like 150cm to 230cm! Sick! Feature got completly different! But i prefer it at higher level thought. No more worrying about rocks, going huge, making some sweet links, that's it!

Today or tomorrow we are going to Lienz for competition, I'm curious how spot will be looking this year but I'm looking forward for this contest!

See ya in Lienz then!

Bartosz

Competition first clash.

2011-05-24T03:24:00.000-07:00

Allo!

Such alot of things happened lately but I had no internet connection so I couldn't write before. Lets start from begining.

Kadan competition were first, alot of good paddlers from all around the world. Competition were organised perfectly! All in schedule with some extra company and party! Those who didn't come should regret alot!
In the Morning Prelims where i came second after Honza Spindler. Also Russian crew which I've been training did really nice job there! It was so nice to see how they improved and did moves in rides which they had just learned! After that it came to semi-finals where I did such a sweet ride which I'm really proud of! Nice entry Mcnasty straight to air phoenix monkey after and after this perfect link tricky woo to clean cartwheel to mc nasty ! It looked awesome! Unfortunatly after semi finals my Russian friends had to leave home becouse of work and long long way to home. After saying good bye to them I joined the party which lasted all night long! Next day was day of the finals with such good paddlers! Czech Champion Honza Spindler, German Champion Martin Koll, Austrian Champion Marcel Bloder and great Czech paddler Jirka Langer. I did really good ride doing almost every trick but unfortunetly not every of them was perfect enough to get scored by judges. Honza Spindler did awesome ride also which got better scored by judges and gave him first place. Anyway It was really huge fun to compete with those guys and i enjoyed it alot! After everything finished i joined German crew this time - Martin Koll, Philip Vorbohle, Thomas Hinkel and Mr Zohan. We left to the plattling. Then i joined the Plattling camp family which is growing with everyday! I was so happy to see Thomas Dunphy, Orky, Sammy, Emilly and James with Katya ! It's soo cool that each day there is new face and new tent with some new stories! So nice to train with all those people!

When we arrived to plattling the water level was best since two months and it was so cool to paddle there! I did all moves which i learned including few huge matrixes and some links like tricky woo to back loop or back loop to mc nasty! Unfortunatly this paradise lasted only for one day. Water dropped super fast and came back to It's "normal level" - around 150cm. Which is actually completly crap. It's super hard to stick anything, getting air is really hard but the worse thing are stones. All the time you are hitting them, tricky woos, wheels, end of jumps and making loop and space godzillas in carbon boat is suicide! I broken my Cowwys nose at thursday and was terrified ! Fortunatly thanks to big help from friends It got repaired just in one day and was ready to hit the Graz! Thanks again for helping me mostly Peter Csonka and Vladimir Cako but also all who helped me with scratching and things like Thomas and others! Thanks! So in the evening we had cool football match as other form of training! That was really nice match!

At thursday evening our friend Hannes arrived and in team consisting of Martin Koll, Thomas Dunphy, Hannes, Orky and me we left to Graz. We found nice sleeping place at 6 feet wide grass zone near parking at the bank of river mur. The hole looked similiar to Kadan so i was happy at begining that it could really be good working for me ! But at trainings it didn't look so. It was really retentive and hooking you down. So i spent alot of time training becouse was a bit upset that i couldn't do too much moves. But it was nice to see Martin flying in his boat there! He was really doing great! The hole was near center of graz so alot of people were watching, also just at bank there was beach party so we had some nice audience watching! But the best thing was how the competition were organised. For just 15 euro entry fee we've had alot of treats! On friday and saturday evening big barbecue and at competition day alot of snacks and food so no one was hungry which made our crew very happy! Actually there was one thing which wasn't that good organised becouse there was supposed to be sleeping room that everybody knew about. But everybody were coming there in previous years and me and irish guys were first time there so we spent 2.5h at friday night looking for it at the end finishing at our grass zone. Despite of this it was really good! Whole competition took one day! And there was nearly every paddler from east and central europe! All champions and best guys in one place, really huge crew! After prelims Martin came 3rd and I 5th. Thomas was so close to semi loosing only 30 points and finishing at 11th place. Orky qualified to c1 finals also! At semi finals time water level dropped badly and hole became really dangerous. I nearly drowned catching 3 breathes of water! Similar happened to other guys! After semi finals i was pretty sure that i will not qualify to next round but I finished at 5th place and Martin came 4th ! There was also Seppi Strohmeier, Thomas Andrassy and Honza Spindler! That was really hard even more becouse water kept dropping. I had same situation as in semifinals at my first ride and was feeling really sick.. but the hole was really hard to everybody. At my third ride i did nice air phoenix monnkey, air loop, tricky woo and split wheel so i was counting for box. When it came to ceremony i was so surprised with the scores! Marting ended up at 5th places, Honza whos ride looked really good was 4th then Seppi who was favorite for everyone came 3rd! When they announced that Tomo is 2nd I was so amazed and happy! This is huge achievment for me! Thanks everybody for competition, it was great!

Results From Kadan

http://cnawr.cz/1085-vysledky-kadan.html

Graz Interview

http://www.kleinezeitung.at/allgemein/video/multimedia.do?action=showEntry_VideoDetail&id=153397&project=462

And Results from Graz

http://www.kajakgraz.com/willkommen/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=86:results-graz-2011&catid=37:freestyle-wettkampf

Here is video made by Philip! Cool one!

http://freecaster.tv/kayak/1016000/graz-rodeo

Thanks for reading,

Bartosz!

Day 6' Kadan

2011-05-06T07:33:00.000-07:00

I woke up today and looked outside my tent. Baloons. Baloons everywhere. I thought I'm still sleeping or something so I went back for short nap and looked out again. What's going on? Ha! Ljoha and Ola birthday celebrating day ! Cool! Happy birthday to you guys again. After stretching and warm up i went for training session with Miha and Swietla. Since I came here I already learned perfect tricky woo on the left side and I'm close to do same on the right side! Even more, I'm starting figuring out Lunar Orbit! And also space godzilla has new SPACE meaning for me! Miha has also Vajda boat and seeing him flying is so cool! Stealth is awesome! Check out some cool pictures made by Ola!

Day 1,2,3

2011-05-03T09:59:00.000-07:00

Woooho! It's awesome! Russian friends picked me from Łodź and we driven to Lwówek, where we spent whole second day paddling! Platform made there is really awesome, It makes nice hole allowing to do every hole trick! After cool day we left to Kadan where we are now. Hole here is working perfectly! It's even better then Lwówek with this level of water! It's so cool to paddle with such nice guys, I even start to understand more and more Russish language : )

We maybe stay here for one more day and then probably go to plattling where water level is rising!

Now, a word about boat. IT IS AWESOME. At first training in Lwówek i was getting use to balance which has to be completly controled but now after morning session in Kadan nothing can stop me! All hardest tricks with air bonuses comes EASY! More on, I had always problems with wheels so tricky woo, lunar , cartwheels, splits were super hard for me but now? I've found a conclusion! I can do supercleans on both sides and made few cool tricky woos already! And it's just 2nd of paddling! Still working on lunar orbit ; ).

I'm gonna upload some vid and pics later, now going for training !

I will upload some photos and video later!

Departure.

2011-04-30T17:51:00.000-07:00

So it's 02:51, I've finished up my packing. Tomorrow at 9 am I'm taking bus to Łódź where Miha and Russian friends are going to pick me up and we are going to Jeziorsko! It's going to be awesome! I'm not sure how long we are going to stay there, mostly it depends on waterlevels. We might go to Lwówek Śląski later to check one more spot, but who knows what comes next. Our target target is Plattling! I'm going to stay there till competition! Which means nearly whole 2 months! There is also Kadan competition on the way so if I will be able to catch up with someone that goes there I would love to compete there !
I can't wait to meet all ppl that I've not seen for so long! I already know that i will catch up with Tom and Orky from Irland which means huge party , nothing else.

I plan to work very hard with everyday running, strength exercies, stretching and 2-3 trainings per day. My target is to get best perfomence and do my best at competition. But actually I'm so excited about kayaking for so long! It gives so much fun and even more with my Vajda boat! Those will be first true tests of my cow, I'm sure it will be super awesome!

One thing that I'm worried about is that I've so many things with me! I'm not sure that I will be able to walk with all of them, anyway it will surely look funny :D!

Nighty,

Bartosz

Power Balance is unbelievable!

2011-04-19T11:17:00.000-07:00

Just a little bit more and I'm leaving for huge trip! Germany, Slovenia, Austria, Norway ! That''s going to be blast!

Yesterday I was given Power Balance wristband. IT IS AWESOME! I didn't believe that it works until i tried! It improves my agility and sense of balance! It's unbelievable ! I can't wait to test it in boat! I let my friends try it and they couldn't believe it either! Power Balance is BLAST! I reccomend it alot to every athlete!

Yours,

Bartosz

New boat new spot and chance of huge trip! YAY!

2011-04-06T08:03:00.000-07:00

Hi! At last some sun behind windows and warm degrees. That means start of season!

So ! The most important thing for meee !

I finally got my own carbon boat! Which is awesome! It's super light, everything i tried was super easier, carves are allowing me to get each move super easy without nearly any power needed! It flies soo much higher and linking any moves is super easy now!

Unfortunetly i had spine injury and i was out from trainings for month.. I haven't finished outfiting my boat yet when it came to competition.

LooP was held in Zabierzow as every year. This competition were organised really good thought not everybody came, but those who couldn't should regret it alot! At my prelims ride my screw ripped of and i had 2nd ride without back of my seat but still did over 1000 points! That boat is blast! I was leading after prelims with some advantage but unfortunatly i didn't manage to defend my position and title at finals. Althought i was looking for gold i can't say i'm dissapointed, I'm still getting used to speed of my Cow and got some outfiting to finish. Those were good competition, thanks for organisators.

Now, I've put myself quest which is actually pretty hard and needs alot of time but I'm sure I will manage to accomplish it. My quest is to find places to train freestyle kayaking in Poland. Any that i find i will describe here at my blog.

So far it started around middle of february. With -7 degrees outside i went to Dobczyce just 20km away from Cracow where i live. There is dam and water power station. I was given a picture of something which might be a nice hole so i had to check it! From the bank i already figured that's it's pretty weak one, but I had to give it a try. So after warm up I jumped at my Cow. Maybe it wouldn't be that bad but unfortunatly it was super shallow! It gave my Cow few ugly scartches so after few more entries i gave it up also becouse water and weather were freezing! Still i managed to handle there for like 30 min.

Next trip was at last sunday. My buddy from Czestochowa shown me once at party pretty interesting place so as soon as i got nice weather I went to visit him!
I took my friend Madek who was taking some nice pictures and Mikołaj who was same as Madek interested in kayaking also we had Gosia with us but it wasn't her first try with freestyle ;).
The hole is very deep, and lookis wide! Unfortunatly it has only one tide 'hole' at whole length where i were able to make some moves, at other places i was sucked at side immedietly which actually made this place a bit dangerous so i'd recommend it only for experienced kayakers who has perfected both sides of standing up. And here again my Cow has shown her blastness! Each putting my nouse down and starting to wheel was super easy! Boat did few cartwheels for me by itself! Making anything was atleast twice faster then before ! All jumps were big even without strong pushing up from the hole! (It's pretty hard to Loop there becouse at beggining it's not pushing you up becouse it's pretty weak at this and when you want to land a jump you will probably hit the green water)
Now, most amazing thing for me. I did , no, it wasn't me. My boat did lunar orbit for me! That was awesome! I did it for the first time! and it was so perfect! Unfortunatly video camera wasn't set up yet and i didn't manage to repeat it later but still it was cool! I'm sure that thanks to this boat i will be able to do it very soon!
After that I trained Gosia, Madek, Mikołaj and also my buddy from Czestochowa Thomas. Everyone enjoyed it alot which made me very happy !

Now, what's next ? Well, i've big big plans! I hope to leave after Easter and train for World championships and then travel from competition to competition! In few days all should be clear how much of those plans i will be able to complete.

See ya soon!

Yours,

Bartosz

Here are few photos from Czestochowa!

16.01 Short look back

2011-01-16T12:18:00.001-08:00

Long time since i written. I'm kinda too lazy to do that. Anyway, winter and then new season. Last season i did pretty good, i'm very proud of 5th place at world cup also winning flatwater competition was important for me same as 3rd place at Cunovo, where alot of good paddlers came.
This year will be full of self-work for me. I hope to start more and more training different then kayaking which will overall make my strength, agility and condition better. Also new 'age' for me has came. I've already ordered new boat - Stealth L made by Vajda. I can't wait to test it!

I've alot of plans connected with kayaking this year, if i manage to make atlast half of them come true it will be awesome. So now it's winter which means alot of flatwater training for me but now i gotta go back to studying coz soon my exams starts!

Bartosz

P.S

ah ! i forgot. I've made new movie clip from last year, hope you enjoy it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJPnwQPL-ls

July, eh?

2010-07-28T05:43:00.000-07:00

Hi again,

So, writing once per month sounds actually alot for me :D anyway, i've failed at europeans in lienz, was 14th :( which is dissapointment for me. I did very good first ride but judges didn't count 3/4 of moves : / That shows me that i've alot of work to do.

On friday i'm leaving for great competition in Sopac in czech republic, i hope it will be atleast as cool as last year! :D

Bartosz

2010-06-11T07:10:00.000-07:00

11 VI 2010

It's been a while since my first post. I was kinda busy with training and too lazy later to write.

So i ended up 2nd at Polish Championships, first was Tomasz Czaplicki and third Michal Wrzal. Competitions were organised perfectly! Everything was on time, we experienced not even little delay! Also playspot was awesome becouse they built it special for this competition! For me it was a bit too vertical so i had problem with McNastys and i didn't liked it that much, but after competition i learned how to make tricky woos in it so i was very happy.

Event ended at sunday and monday "morning" i left to augsburg. almost 700km was kinda big challenge for me as young driver, but i stand a face to it without any problems and brakes so i was kinda proud. althought my trip plan changed and i ended up in plattling to have some chill in my favorite playspot where i met EJ and Dane training. I enjoyed stay there but after morning training i left to augsburg. I spent week of training there. I didn't like this playspot at all, i'm better at left side tricks which i couldn't do there becouse of flushy shoulder. After eliminations i ended up 11th so i got into quaters, it was nice in this hole for me but i had ambitions for higher locate. After quaters (which were delayed ALOT) i ended up 8th! My mate - Tomasz from representation was 10th. So we had two guys from Poland i semi of WC! Sweet! In semi i failed my first ride but in second i went big! I ended up 4th! just before Peter Csonka! I was so proud and happy that i couldn't stop smiling i finals and i really enjoyed it. I ended up 5th but still it was great! i was in finals with best paddles all over the world and got beaten by great paddler James Bebbington- who came first, Last year world cup winner - Peter Csonka, Actual European champion Matthew Dumoulin and 4 times World Champion Eric Jackson so i wasn't dissapointed by loosing place. After Augsburg i went straight to plattling.

First two days in plattling were great for me! I did all moves i could in short time that i started wondering what else can i do when i'll have time left while ride? So i started learning back loop, but after two days hole got into wave and water kept rising. It ended up as little flood so we have had to move our tents from bank of river to behind wall and at Friday evening they canceled the event. So i ended up in general classification at 5th place at world cup! Althought i was dissapointed that plattling got canceled becouse i hoped for good score there i'm happy anyway. It's great score just in first year of being senior!

Then i went straight to lienz.
I stopped in salzburg on my way. There was great wave but unfortunatly it was too hard for me, it was very narrow, just about 0,5m ! and almost only green water and getting there from the eddy was very hard. I met EJ and Dane there also, they were doing great there but it was too hard for me. To fullfil my badluck i've wounded badly my right hand and broken my paddle... Then EJ gave me his extra one, i'm so greatful for that! Thanks again. That allows me to train in lienz.

Now i'm almost full week i'm in lienz. Water here is terrible cold. Water level is changing day by day.. yesterday i had great session. Did some nice McNasties and Phoenix Monkeys. It's place good to make huge airloops and space godzillas which i'm working at. I spent first 3 days on getting used to my new paddle, becouse it's heavier and has 30 degrees while my previous had only five. But now it seems to be working good for me. I'm spending time now with 2 trainings per day and having fun with friends, yesterday we played football at pool, my team won both matches! That was cool :)!

Bartosz

Start

2010-05-19T15:03:00.000-07:00

20 V 2010

In 14 hours i've my last matura exam, then i'm leaving for long trip. First heading to Jelenia Góra for Polish Championships in Freestyle Kayak then World Cup in Augsburg and Plattling, after one week break which i'll spend traveling between playspots, there will be european championships. I hope it will be awesome month of kayaking !