Jay Kincaid – 2003 World Champion, sends in this update from his home in Reno

By Jay Kinkaid Learn more about Jay here

March 7, 2006

The last couple of weeks here in Reno have been great. We have had high
water and the river has been really good. I have been paddling a lot with
Jason Craig, who is twelve years old, and his father. Paddling with Jason
has been a lot of fun for me because no matter how cold it is, he is just
stoked to be kayaking, and that is very contagious. It is also really fun to watch him learn. Kids are so cool because they learn by just doing it. They
don’t need, or necessarily want all kinds of verbal instruction. I like the
attitude of; I am just going to keep trying this over and over again until I get it, because just trying it is fun.

Other then that I have been learning and relearning a lot of stuff myself,
and that is fun for me. In the last couple of weeks I have started to feel
confident enough in my neck that I can go at near 100 percent. The key for
me right now is forcing myself to stretch for 15 or 20 minutes before I
paddle. As long as I do that I can paddle really hard without much worry.

This last Saturday I spent the day judging at a hunting dog competition. I
would have loved to compete with one of my dogs but the entry fee was a
little step. It was a ton of fun though as good times were had by all. Those
of you who have never seen such a thing would be amazed at how fired up
these dogs are to find birds and compete. They go all out simply because
they are being allowed to do what is breed in them to do. Hunt birds. Call
me what you like, but I love bird dogs.

Since then the river has dropped down to a medium high flow and been
averaging around 2 hours a day on the water. So, until next time, you can
find me on the river, at the home office, or out in the field with the dogs.

Jay