Pyranha – Freestyle, fun and Frolics

The sun shone and the skies were blue for the 1st British Freestyle league event of 2010. This was also the 1st of the events counting for selection for the 2010-2011 British Freestyle team on the Tryweryn.

The top hole (above the chipper) was used for the event, which is a very tricky hole, quite steep and flushy, you need a super quick roll to stop you being flushed below the eddy. A few of us got there bright and early Saturday morning to have a quick warm up whilst the Pyranha team were setting up the judges stand for the day. The event started slightly late, as is normal for all things freestyle. There was a good turn out for the day and it got off to a good start. The Open Event was designed to get people involved in freestyle, then it was on to the main competition. As the results are being used for the selection it was 3 rides, best 2 count, most moves were possible as shown by Sam Anderson who had a total score of 990 for 2 rides! During my heats I had a bad 1st run, but then had a good 2nd run scoring all the moves I’d planned. Unfortunately my 3rd run wasn’t as good and I flushed so I had to settle for 4th place. In the ladies event there were some excellent paddling with Emily Wall scoring a Felix to win the competition.

In the final heat of the day the water suddenly dropped, panic ensued and there were people talking on walky talkies, no one seemed to quite know if it was coming back. It was far to shallow to paddle, but eventually they managed to get the man at the dam to readjust it and it was back on. There were some informal finals at the end of the day for the junior and senior men, where the main aim was go big or go home! Which made for some entertaining viewing!

The party was a rather chilled affair arranged by Pyranha in a field near the river, however strangely most of the Pyranha people disappeared! But we made the most of it and had a well earned drink as the sun went down and the midges came out to play.

Sunday was the day of the Boater X, to be run from Cafe Wave down to Chapel Falls, a lot of the freestyle paddlers didn’t have big boats with them so decided not to enter, but there was about 10 men and 10 junior men up for the challenge, unfortunately I had to race with the men as I was the only lady, but I was pleased I managed to keep up with them all the way down! After they had all battled for 1st placed the rest of the day was spent messing around on the river in boats, all in all a good weekends boating, Thanks Pyranha.