Of the numerous methods we can use to paddle more skillfully (e.g., torso rotation, paddling from the core, and learning to roll) none is discussed less than simply paddling faster with fewer strokes.

The benefits are numerous. Fewer strokes means you glide and take a short break between each stroke, creating what athletes call micro-rests, and allowing your kayak to glide on its own buoyancy.

Paddling with fewer strokes reduces mental fatigue as well. You focus less on how many miles to go, more on how to vary your cadence and output. Time-to-go before landfall passes less slowly—you have thoughts to focus on other than how long you’ve been grinding along.

Using fewer strokes also allows you to exploit a kayak’s most hidden—and potent—source of forward motion: the very buoyancy of the hull in which paddlers plant their butts with such rounded firmness.

Gliding, buoyancy, and a rest between each stroke. Now those are some ways to increase speed, efficiency and endurance.

The following drills are designed to teach you each of these valuable skills: how to glide between strokes, how to insert a micro-rest between each stroke, and how to fully exploit your kayak’s buoyancy by gliding forward on the surface of the hull. Like a well-coached swimmer, you’ll find yourself using less power and more efficiency to propel yourself forward. What’s more, to work the drills, you won’t need anything other your kayak, your paddle, and the patience to count strokes between two points.

DRILL #1
Pick out two points you can paddle between without getting technical—i.e., no need to brace, compensate for weathercocking, or worry about getting run down by a powerboat. Pick two points you can paddle between in less than a minute or two: two lobster pots, say, a pair of buoys, the corner of the dock and a tree or boulder on shore. Paddle as you would normally. Don’t try to sprint and don’t try to gussy your stroke with any of the frills you learned last week at that symposium. Rather, focus only on stroke count. How many strokes does it take you to pass between the two points?

Let’s say it took 40 strokes.

Keep the number in mind when you return to your starting point. For your return, reduce your original stroke count by 10% or so—in this case, from 40 to about 36.

Simple, to eliminate four strokes. But also not so, because to reduce strokes you need to pause—i.e., glide and exploit buoyancy—between strokes.

Good start.

Now it’s time to work.

Paddle the route once more. This time however, reduce your original stroke count by 30%, from 40 strokes to 28 or so.

Not so simple this time. You have to be that much more aware of allowing your kayak to glide (read: you to rest) between strokes. Don’t worry about an inevitable sensation of paddling more slowly. Instead, what you’re truly doing is allowing your kayak do more of the work.

Now paddle the route a fourth time, but reduce your stroke to 50% of the original, or from 40 to 20.

You’ll discover that to reduce your stroke count so drastically, you’ll need to let your boat glide (read: ride on its own buoyancy) a long distance between strokes. By long-gliding, it’s your kayak’s buoyancy which helps it sustain its own forward motion, yet with no help from you. Your kayak can do what it’s meant to do: glide forward on propulsion you provide with strokes.

Test whether this reduced stroke count actually slows you down. Ask a friend to time each of your four runs. If you maintain the same level of exertion for each, you’ll discover you paddle just as fast with fewer strokes.

DRILL #2
In Drill #2, the rubber hits the road: you feel what it’s like to vary not only the cadence but the gears of your stroke.

Run Drill #1 as before. This time, even as you reduce your stroke count, try also to reduce your time between points. First try to reduce your time by 5%, then 10%, then finally 15% or 20%.

You’ll have to increase your gearing. In other words, even as you reduce your stroke count, you’ll have to put more oomph (torso rotation) into each stroke. You’ll force your body, like a bicycle rider or a driver shifting into fourth gear, to use a higher, more powerful gear and a lower stroke count.

Your heart will pump hard on this drill. Be wary of overexertion!

DRILL #3
Here’s where you learn to feel that paddling is more a sport of gears, less one of grinding along to the monotonous beat of a metronome. Run point A to point B once more. This time, rather than decrease your stroke count, increase it by 10%, 25%, 50% and so on.

You’ll find you can do so only with quick and light strokes that allow you to paddle below huff-and-puff level. Light, quick, closely spaced pitter-patter strokes have tremendous value. They relieve mental fatigue on long trips by stimulating a sense of movement without increasing your workload. Like a bicycle racer shifting to a lower gear to blur the bike’s wheels on a flat road, you move fast without working too hard.

Try these drills next time you head out. After you’ve tried them, you’re ready for the next set of drills to change your paddling from a relatively sedentary activity into one that will both test and improve your cardiovascular health.