2015 Dam N Back Review

Dam N Back 2015

Although this race is only 10 miles long, it proved to be much more of a challenge than most anticipated. The race started on the shore in Riverside Park in Yankton, SD where paddlers raced 5 miles up the river, against the current for the first stretch of the race to the turnaround point where a half way token was presented to paddlers. Not only did paddlers have to fight the current, a headwind built up making progress up river move at a crawling pace while trying to reach the half way point. At times, some paddlers were struggling to hold onto the progress they made if they stumbled into the channel.  Many thought the hard part was done and over with since the current could help carry them back to the finish line but racers were not fortunate enough for that to be the case. On the way back, the wind shifted creating a headwind for the last half of the downriver stretch. The wind continued to build up as racers were making their way to the finish line. Gusts of wind made racers exert every bit of energy remaining to cross the finish line and run up the embankment to the finish line. 

During this race, I paddled a Stellar SES Excel layup surf ski. The sleek design of the ski was very suitable for racing up the river at a speed of 5+ mph. Matt Story was paddling his Fenn surf ski that was about ¾” wider than the SES and was on my tail until we were in sight of the turnaround point. The inlet was shallow so I got hung up briefly after grabbing the token before heading back down river. I lost some of the distance that I had gained due to getting hung up. Matt has always been one of my favorite folks to paddle with being at a similar level/ability to push one another. He did exactly that on the way down river. Both Matt and I were relatively new to paddling surf skis so stability was not the strongest suit when pushing one another at the end in a full sprint. I didn’t look behind before taking off giving it my all when I reached the bridge since I knew he would be behind me. I reached the shoreline and crossed the finish line and turned to see Matt right there as well. He hopped out of his boat a little bit farther out from shore thinking it was still shallow but it was deep enough that his feet did not make contact with the bottom. Despite the deeper exit, he finished less than a minute behind me. Watching others finish after us was amazing as well. Granted a couple of us had light, high performance boats, it took a lot of strength and determination for others to battle the current and wind in significantly heavier boats. It was a great, challenging race to start off the 2015 paddling season. The water ended up being warmer than anticipated for early May and the air temps were comfortable for just compression layers to be worn. 10 miles was a comfortable distance overall and the 5 mile upriver portion added a nice challenging element to the race overall.