07 All Star ROCKS the Ottawa!

By Stephen Wright

After 2 Weeks back on the mighty Ottawa river, I’ve come to a
conclusion: The new All Star is amazing on this river. It’s the perfect
weapon to enjoy the big water, big waves, big holes, and small waves and
holes of this playboating mecca. I have been fortunate enough to enjoy
river levels from 8 1/2 all the way down to -1 today. It’s nice to have a
boat that’s fast and smooth enough for Corner Wave (I’ve never been able to
clean blunt there before….), forgiving enough to stick landings on Garb,
AND will still out-loop everything on the water in Pushbutton or Black’s!
I’ve had a great time working with the Keener Program again as Head Coach.
There are lots of kids in JK boats here, and some of them are THROWING DOWN!
Quinn from Oregon hit the biggest air-loop that I’ve ever seen in an 07 All
Star in Farmer Black’s hole this past week. It’s also fun to watch local
hero Keegan smoothly rip-up corner wave and garb. Australian James has been
our Freestyle Champion for the past 2 weeks with McNasty’s and huge pan-ams!
They’ve now been trained and certified in Swiftwater Rescue, and First Aid/
CPR…which makes me feel great about paddling with all of them. I’m
psyched to have Nick Troutman and Ruth Gordon joining us to instruct next
week. Check-out the Keener Blog (where they are all forced to post weekly
🙂 ):

www.okskeener.blogspot.com/

I have evenings and weekends off and have been able to paddle with other
Team JK paddlers Joel Kowalski, Rafa Ortiz, and Billy Harris–as well as
other incredible paddlers like Dave N and Irish Moe. It’s awesome to have
such fantastic boaters to work and play with. Billy’s consistent rides and
his analyzing methods of learning are inspiring (So are his righty airscrews
on CW), while Joel’s smooth style is amazing to watch, and Rafa is like some
kind of energy ball or maybe a Mexican jumping bean all over Corner Wave.
What a great place to be! I’m tired and sore in ways that I haven’t been
since Uganda and I LOVE IT! It’s hard to want to take a day-off to recover
worn-out muscles now that Garb is back. Black Dog is in Doggie Heaven, as
she can swim all over the place and roam free all day. She likes to
hang-out on the island next to McKoy’s rapid while I’m gone and watch rafts
and kayaks all day.

Live from the Ottawa (The OTHER happiest place on earth),
Stephen Wright