A few weekends ago now, I was lucky enough to head to Nottingham white water course with Alex and Rob, from Friday night till Sunday, so we could have 2 full days of paddling, (apart from Rob, as he’s just graduated from Uni, so has no money!) and what was even better, was that we took the demo Jed with us to have try out in a hole!
As we were all working together at the boat centre on the Friday, we decided to head to Nottingham straight after work, having packed the van the night before, so we could just get up, have a 5 minute (if that!) drive to the course, then go boating!
When we got there on Friday night, we got everything out the van and decided to start cooking some food. I opened my cooker up to get it ready, when I realised I had forgotten something rather important, the gas! Luckily, Alex had a spare can I could use, so I didn't go hungry.
The next day meant time to hit the water! We chose not to film on the first day and save it all for Sunday as we wanted to have a practise, and Alex and Rob hadn’t been in a hole in ages, as they’ve been paddling Hurley whilst it’s been running.
The first day I mainly stuck in my Rockstar, but had a quick run in the Jed before lunch, and I loved it. As we’d met another CKT team paddler, Jake Boswell there too, he was quick to jump in the Jed when we’d stopped for lunch, as when he loved it when he paddled it in the pour over at the Nene.
On the Sunday, I decided to just use the Jed all day, as I really liked it the day before. I found it easy to spin into a back blast for a McNasty, and it seemed to be very responsive. I found it suited my style of paddling. I didn’t seem to go as big in the Jed as I feel I do in the Rockstar, but other moves seemed to go a lot better for me, such as getting into the back blast to throw a mcnasty, due to it being really loose and easy to throw around so the stern just sailed up onto the green ready for me to pull round and throw the loop. Cartwheels were also a lot easier due to the slicey edges and volume distribution, this meant the ends just sliced through the water.
Pyranha have also recently announced their new ‘elite’ outfitting, so will definitely keep my eye on that to see what it’s going to be like!
I am very tempted to change for a Jed, but I think I’m going to wait to try the new Dagger Jitsu and the 2013 Jackson All Star, as from what I’ve seen they also looks like very good boats!
Check out the video of me in the Jed at hpp;
See you on the water,
Pete
