Ok, here it is,

My own little spot on Boatertalk.

Rocky was the nickname I received during my first paddling holiday with the guys from our club. You might think I 'earned' it by paddling that T-slalom into every rock in the river but fortunately that was not the case.

It's because next to the kayak virus I've got the Megalithic virus as well.

There were some tombs in the area so I was trying to persuade the others to go and have a look.

So that's how they found out about my passion for 'big rocks' and a nickname was born.

 

Above I wrote that I started paddling in 2001 but that's not really true. I went on a kayaking trip in the Belgian Ardennes for a week as a school trip when I was in the 3rd grade. Man, what fun we had in those T-slaloms. In fact I enjoyed it so much that I went for a second trip 2 years later (1991).

I don't know what happened in the 10 years after that???

In 2001 I moved from Antwerp to back to Bergen op Zoom and for some strange reason the kayak virus became active. The first thing I did when I got back was check out the kayak club. I signed up and now I'm one of the most active members. And now I really wonder what happened between 1991 and 2001. I really enjoyed the kayak holiday from our school and I don't understand why I didn't join a club back then.
I could have been a paddler with more than ten years of experience DOH!

Anyway, I've been paddling since May 2001 and I'm really addicted. My first holiday with the club was in the French Pyrenees (Oct 2001) where I got my nickname.

Other places I've paddled since:
Ourthe, Ambleve, Lesse, Salm, Aisne in the Belgian Ardennes,
Rur, Prum, Nimms, Irreler wasserfalle in the Eiffel region in Germany,
Sanna, Inn, Salza, Gail, Isel and Drau in Austria,
Reuss (Bremgarten) in Switzerland,
Isar (Plattling) in Germany,
Durance, Guil, Ubaye, Onde, Claree, Tarn and Lot in France,
and last but not least; kayak surfing at the Dutch coast.

Rio Noquera Pallaresa in the Spanish Pyrenees Running the "Pastis" rapid Wheel-attempt

 

Surfing the "Gabi" wave on the Drau in Austria

 

Surfing the lower Bremgarten wave on the Reuss in Switzerland

After my first holiday I wrote a rather long trip report for the club magazine. Shouldn't have done that… I was immeadeatly appointed as writer /editor of the magazine. So I wrote a couple of trip reports and luckily that inspired some other people to start writing as well and now our club mag is bigger than ever. But to keep me busy they gave me another task: webmaster of the club's site. But I have a good time doing it so I guess it's OK.

Update Aug 2004: due to a new job I handed over my club-responsibilities, from now on I only run the Freewheelers-site

Update March 2006: the club magazine is thinner than ever.. maybe I should start writing again...

After paddling in club boats (T-slalom , Hurricane) for a while I bought my first boat in Feb 2001. Since I considered myself to be a modern guy I went straight for a planning hull design. It had to be a big guys boat though so I bought myself a Riot Grind.

About a year later I bought my second Riot boat, a Trickster.I was quite happy with the combination, using the Grind for big water and the Trickster for playing.

 

Nasal enema in the Grind

 

Surfing the Trickster

2004 doubled my boat collection: In januari my Mega Marauder surfkayak arrived and in August I bought an Eskimo Salto for hairboating.

Altough the Trickster outsurfs all the latest spudboats it is still no match for a dedicated surfcraft.
Since I really like surfing (as opposed to buttbouncing down a wave) I decided to step it up a little.
The Marauder is awesome; full kevlar/carbon construction, agressive rails, trifin set-up and virtually no stern rocker make it ultra fast and super agressive.

Unfortunately my Volkswagen van with the Marauder and all my paddling gear in it was stolen in October 2004...
Apart from the material loss I was also robbed of several months of very good surfing conditions on the Dutch coast :-(

This short footage is all that remains of my beloved surfcraft; unfortunately it doesn't do the boats performance any justice.

With the arrival of my Eskimo Salto the Grind faced its retirement. I wondered if I would ever be able to get rid of it. It seems like everyone in The Netherlands is into spud boats nowadays. Eeventually I was able to sell it to another big-boned boater who was just starting out.

I really like my Salto, although some people on BT think the Salto is only suitable for paddlers of average weight. I weigh about 220# with all my gear and I think it handles beautifully. Very good maneuverability, easy to get up to speed, excellent stability, resurfaces great and increadibly easy to punch through holes. And then there is Eskimo's blowmolded PE: absolute BOMBER..

In May 2005 Malcolm of Mega kayaks made me an offer on a virtually unused demo-Marauder I just coudn't refuse :-)
Just one week later we had some of the cleanest Dutch surf ever:

The boat is actually a modification of the original Marauder design; it its a little wider and has a bigger cockpit to accomodate the "bigger paddlers" like myself. The finboxes have also been moved back a bit. I must admit I'm very pleased with the modifications.

My new Marauder can be seen in action in some of my own clips below:

20 Aug 2005 Spikey dialing in his new DR Fish Blokkipa 17 Mb 16 Sept 2005 Whaizfish vs Rocky : Playboat vs Surfkayak Blokkipa 13 Mb 16 Sept 2005 Playboat vs Surfkayak vs Windsurfer vs Boardsurfer Blokkipa 13 Mb 2 Okt 2005 Thomas, Spikey, El Tee , Jee-Wee and others Ter Heijde 23 Mb 3 Okt 2005 Frank and Rocky in small but superclean surf Blokkipa 18 Mb 26 Okt 2005 Rocky's first session in Belgium Blankenberge 16 Mb 12 Nov 2005 Krusty, Jee-Wee and Rocky Blokkipa 29 Mb 26 Nov 2005 Steve, Krusty, Jee-Wee and Rocky having fun Blokkipa 23 Mb Playboating: Okt/Nov 2005 Trailer Kanoforum.nl playboating trip Plattling /Kuchl 10 Mb

 

 

Freewheelers

Freestyle Kayakers Bergen Op Zoom

After a day playing at the Roermond fishsteps a group of paddlers our club decided to start a rodeo / freestyle kayak team.

After a lot of discussion we still didn't agree on how we should name ourselves… But since I was appointed webmaster of the team's website I have the last word and I decided that we're called "The Freewheelers", at least for the time being ;-)

Freewheelers was the name I came up with, here's my motivation::

· The freewheel is the most radical move in freestyle riverrunning (a good trashing is never far away)
· To 'freewheel' means 'to take it easy'
· A 'freewheeler' is someone who doesn't take life too serious and just does as he pleases
· Freestyle moves include cartwheels, splitwheels, wavewheels and freewheels
· And last but not least: It does sound cool, doesn't it?

Click the pic to go to the Freewheelers site