I am not a great paddler ( understatement ) and despite years of riding my butt still rails against the dreaded boat seat; you get wet, tired, chafed and emotional after hours paddling if you are soft like me.

I asked site sponsors iRULE if they had anything that could work for me and they sent me a pair of TORPEDOES which, like a lot of their kit I knew nothing about ahead of time.

There was some familiarity out of the box in terms of the fabric used, it makes use of the same Meryl Nateo as the best selling MOTUS AR and multi-sport knicks from i-RULE. This was good news as the fabric does all the right technical things in terms of moisture management and airflow but has the bonus of being comfortable as heck and long lasting. The shorts themselves are a longer cut which your legs will welcome.

What was vastly different however was the chamois ( compared to MOTUS ) it covers a sensible area exposed to the seat but is still lightweight. It is made of a fabric called Hydrotex Chopper which looks benign enough, something akin to a very smooth soft no pile synthetic chamois which is a few mms thick. It’s not until you put your back side in the  boat at 5.30am on a drizzling, cold morning and head out on a long paddle that you start to understand how the chamois works. The outer surface keeps the water out and the inner surface allows you to breathe while wicking away sweat. This makes for a comfortable paddle in any condition.

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It’s amazing to see many very good athletes in multi-sport races incapable of accelerating through a field or making a break. The ability to paddle faster when you need to is invaluable isn’t it? So how to you go about improving your paddling speed specifically?

In general terms, boat speed is the product of the power propelling it forward  and the resistance of the water to this effort. A paddle is effective when it is engaged in movement through the water. The time intervals that space paddle strokes can lead to a deprecation in boat momentum. This makes the paddler work harder to accelerate the boat to an acceptable speed consuming precious power and energy in the process. Paddling with fewer, longer paddle strokes is more efficient than multiple short paddle strokes at a higher pace - if each long stroke does not move the boat from its course.

Any decent boat offering a sound paddling position, improved stability and control, and the comfort of being able to reduce fatigue and prevent injury by changing positions adds to the paddler’s effective propulsion and therefore may achieve and sustain higher speed.

According to acclaimed paddling coach Chris Hipgrave “Speed and power in any sport depends on genetics, metabolic capacity, muscle strength and size,nervous system capacity, and skill. With the exception of genetics, your training program must address each factor to maximize speed and power for wild-water.”

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