Frank Havens Race, Washington, D.C.
This is one of the most fun races of the year. Karen Febey was my canoe partner and she is one of the best canoe partners out there. I promised I’d do this race again with her after last year’s race when we had so much fun. This year I told her I hadn’t been training because my dad was sick and she didn’t care. So off to D.C. I went.
This race prohibits all “spiffy” boats. Those are the rules. Yes, really! The rules specifically state that all boats “shall be non-spiffy.” For this race we paddle a big old recreational Old Town canoe that has probably existed since the 1950s. Generally it’s covered with moss and leaves when we arrive at the Washington Canoe Club, because I think the only time it gets used is for this race. I think it weighs approximately one metric ton.
There are some phenomenal paddlers who race in this race. High kneel Olympic hopefuls get into beat up old aluminum canoes and thoroughly kick everyone else’s butts. What’s funny to me is to see the top three teams. All equally matched, very strong, high kneel, young guys who have reached max hull speed in the aluminum canoes. They stay together the whole time, because no one can outrun the other because the boats can’t go any faster. The team I’m most impressed with is the senior team that manages to keep up with these young bucks for the whole race.
Karen and I paddle well together, mostly because she totally understands that I don’t take racing too seriously and do it just for the fun and experience. My favorite part of the race is the buoy turns. Karen is a great steerswoman, and she is excellent at telling me exactly what to do and when. Our buoy turns were so good that we got farther and farther ahead of the teams behind us and closer and closer to those in front of us. Two of the teams behind us commented on how much they liked our turns. We heard one team arguing with each other, with one lady saying “Why can’t we turn like that?”
Frank Havens, a former Olympic medalist, started this race to encourage people to get into racing. He prohibits “spiffy” boats so that no one is intimidated to come. He is succeeding in this. He personally signs all of the awards, which are hand-made model canoe paddles. Karen and I had our picture taken with Mr. Havens as he handed us our awards.
It was a good day.