After today's activities there were a few hours left. Because the wind was blowing at a 5-6Bft force from SW, this was an ideal opportunity to paddle with the 16X and the midwing to the lake "Alkmaardermeer" and play in the waves.
To reach the lake I had to paddle approx. 6km over de Zaan (a river) and some canals where I could also measure the speed I reached.
With the current wind-strength this gives not an accurate measurement but it gives a good indication. Against the wind I measured, paddling at a fitness -pace, 8 km/h. Whereas in the few sheltered sections on the way to my lake I easily reached 9-10km/h. So for the time being I write that cruising at 9(-10)km, in flatwater-conditions with minor wind, should be possible; with good technique and enough trunk-rotation. Later I will check the full-sprint.
While paddling the waves on the lake I felt very secure as the 16X was very stable and allowed paddling at all angles relative to the wave-direction. In the middle of the lake I even fumbled a bit at my GPS, while having my paddle laying on deck, without any unstable experience.
Entering the lake I put my knees under the deck because I don’t have much hip-support in the seat making it more difficult to paddle this waves with the knees loose. From the moment that I locked the knees, I had the feeling that I paddled a totally different boat: it felt if I was paddling a “blood horse”, being very responsive to edging (already with moderate edging) and sweepstrokes, thus being very manoeuvrable. Real fun.
This in contrary to paddling the canals where, paddling with the knees in the centre like in a racing-kayak, I had the experience just paddling a fast touring boot being quite direction-stable.
When edging afterwards at calmer waters, it looks like that edging to a certain angle lifts the bow and stern from the water, decreasing the waterline-length as much that it becomes manoeuvrable. Certainly the shape of the kayak helps because the volume at the midsection probably lifts the kayak while edging. This could however means that a person, being heavier than "my 72kg", could have less benefits from edging. Having written this: I will load the kayak with approx. 20kg of sand in a later stage.
Part of my protocol is paddling a full circle in waves and I discovered that it is difficult to turn the kayak downwind: at a certain moment in my circle she sticks to a course parallel to waves. Not being very familiar with the midwing paddle that I used today for the first time in waves, I could not perform an extreme edging & sweepstroke required to reach the desired direction. There are however more seakayaks performing like this: it has to do with a certain balance between weathercocking and the wind-strength. Normally for a kayak with a variable skeg the solution is to drop the skeg maximal to get the kayak leecocking for a moment and get the kayak turned by the wind.
In case of the 16X the rudder had to do this work: And yes when giving full rudder the kayak turned very quickly off wind in the desired direction. Of course, in contrary to a kayak with skeg, you have to paddle forward to make the rudder able to turn you in this occasion.
Making a note on the midwing-paddle: Above I describes that I was not yet very familiar with it in waves. I think this has to do with the shaft: the shaft is almost round not giving me a blind indication how the paddle behaves in my hand. Especially when making a sweep stroke in big waves the paddle-blade would like to turn a bit which could reduce the effectiveness of the brace you have on the water simultaneously. So my wish is to have oval handgrips for both hands on this paddle. These also helps when you have to apply a very strong sternrudder while giving better control over the asymmetric blade that you are pushing with the back-side on the in the water.
Talking about the rudder: Today I constantly did not feel very familiar with the rudder. Not on the canals nor on the lake. It has to do with the responsiveness of it: after operating the rudder it takes quite long before the kayak responds. To me it felt like the commanding-ropes having too less tension or are being stretched too easy. On the canals this resulted in a little zigzag course because I overcompensated. While paddling in the waves it was especially difficult to paddle the following waves. The 16X broaches easily in these powerful, following waves and I was not able to compensate with the rudder because by the time the kayak responds, I already broached. So I had to work with the old-fashioned paddle-stern-rudder to keep course.
I am familiar with the rudder in my racing K1 which responds much quicker and, certainly on flat water, results in a straight course.
It could be that the commanding-ropes in this demo-kayak should be adjusted a bit, so I will look to that first. Otherwise the supplier should use ropes without stretch (with carbon core?) or even steel cables. Another explanation could be that I have to learn using this Epic-rudder. More on this later in another post.
Being a fan of paddling with the knees in the centre for better efficiency (more trunk-rotation, longer strokes and thus higher speed), it has advantages under moderate conditions to keep course only with a bit of occasional edging. Doing so it seems a nice feature to be able to lock the rudder in de mid-position like it is possible in the newest rudder construction of Epic.
This paddling with the knees unlocked reminds me to having left the lake: I unlocked my knees than and from that moment my speed increased with about 1,5 km/h without changing direction while having the same wind pushing from behind. Which is certainly a reason to improve the hip-contact for me and add some padding in the seat to become able to paddle with unlocked knees in waves as well.
Edging the kayak with unlocked knees and without hip-contact is of course also possible. This feels comfortable at flat water and is more like shifting weight to have the kayak edged. In waves this works out a bit slow and therefor I prefer hip-contact for direct result.
Furthermore, while paddling the canals and the lake I had been thinking about the question if this kayak weathercocks or leecocks in wind. At first I found it difficult to choose because of the influence of rudder, wind, gusts and drift. After a while I concluded that the kayak only leecocks when the wind came from the front at approx. 15°. This however is standard for all seakayaks and here the only question is if the kayak can be brought back on the right course before it hits the next wave. As the 16X is manoeuvrable enough the behaviour is OK for today. And I expect the 16X to behave well at sea under similar conditions.
Finally, at the canal, I concluded that she only weathercocks slightly with the wind coming from the side; I compensated for this by using the rudder as a trim and adjusting it under a small angle. Maybe later I will check this more accurate by using ductape to fixate the rudder and learn what the kayak does.
I think that it is important to know all this, just in case the rudder doesn’t work in a certain occasion and you have to adjust your plans or route. Knowing what is possible or not with the 16X is an advantage than.
Finally more on the midwing-paddle: Except for the round handgrips I have no comments at all. I sorted out that a length of 219cm at 60° angle works best for me. Paddling was flawless: the blades has a smooth entry and getting out of the water. No vibration in the blade while paddling. Of course I will try later all kind of strokes and rolling with it. Two strokes I already used: sculling sideways while taking off from the quay. This was not too bad, just a bit different from a conventional paddle but not tricky.
Another stroke was the sweepstroke which wasn't too bad either. Sweeping with the wing is not as trustworthy however as a conventional paddle, but much better than what I experienced with another wing. I only would like, as describe above, to have oval handgrips to gain more control in other strokes than the forward stroke.
All this was about paddling the 16X.
What I also like at the 16x is its weight. To enter the Zaan I had to get out of the kayak for passing a lock. As I can carry the very light 16X with one hand at the cockpit-rim, walking felt like a quiet "sundaymorningwalk".
(I only would sand the edge on the inside of the cockpit-rim a bit as it cuts into my fingers)