2019 Dirty Bird Confidence Series Recap

Every year Paddle In Pink hosts an event on the Pigeon River in TN to raise money for the Live Like Maria Foundation. The event consists of a group of women all slicing and playing their way down the river and for the Southeast, this is not a common scene which makes this event even more special for me. 

The J.A.W. (Jackson Action Wagon) once again was brought for anyone to demo a Jackson Kayak. I love to demo kayaks but to demo for free, well, that is even better. The MixMaster and Rockstar were high in demand and a number of girls decided to take advantage of the demos. Foxfire Riverside Campground provided us with a great venue to not only host the event but it gave us the chance to camp and extend the event beyond the river.

There was no shortage of smiling and encouraging faces in all eddies along the river. To be surrounded by a number of amazing women, that all are working to improve their skills shows me that playboating is indeed not dead in the southeast!

As always, Jackson Kayak was the main sponsor and a brand new MixMaster 7.0 was raffled off. With numbers down a bit this year, all ladies walked away with some swag as our sponsors were pretty incredible this year. The grand prize winner was Meg Pullin. She is fairly new to the sport and super stoked on kayaking. Once the raffle was complete, Meg wanted to take her new boat out so I joined her to paddle down to the NOC hole to play to exhaustion. Listening to Meg and seeing her stoke level makes an event like this so great – it allows like-minded females to enjoy such a rad sport! 

A huge shout out to all sponsors. There is no way I could put this event on without you. Also, a huge thanks to all the ladies that came out to enjoy the day. Until next year.

Our sponsors this year:

Jackson Kayak, Kokatat, Watershed Dry Bags, Mountain Khakis, Buck Bald Brewing, Ace Kayak School, Ace Rafting, Ocoee Dog Day Care, Nikki Malatin for donating a mountain bike lesson, Liz Koch of Blue Ridge Biomechanics, Steph Metzger of Hands, Pyranha, and Mountain Rivers Jewelry