Australia Kayak Festival :

Monsoon Madness from Jez Jez on Vimeo.

Le week-end dernier a eu lieu le Monsoon Madness festival, qui correspond aux championnats nationaux de course extrême en kayak, puis en freestyle.

Ça m’a fait trop plaisir d’y participer ! La course extrême était sous une forme que je n’avais encore jamais vu: la première manche est un contre la montre individuel. Moins de trois minutes de sprint sur les rapides pour ensuite voir son classement.

A partir de là, les 16 premiers sont sélectionnés pour la course ‘Head to Head », c’est-à dire en 1 contre 1 : le premier se retrouve avec le 16^ème, le second avec le 15^ème … Celui des deux qui gagne est sélectionné pour la manche d’après, soit les 8 premiers.

Après chaque manche, le perdant doit porter le kayak du gagnant en haut du parcours !

Ça continue jusqu’à la fin pour délimiter le vainqueur. En gros c’est une course ultra intense qui demande énormément d’énergie, car tant qu’on gagne les duels, on repart pour une autre manche !

Au total, j’ai fait plus de 5 passages de course en sprint sur la journée. Je me suis retrouvé vidé, sans aucune énergie ! D’autant plus qu’il fait une chaleur à crever ici, et que l’eau est à 28 degré. Pas facile de se rafraichir… Mais c’était vraiment trop excellent !

Je termine à la 2^ème place de la course extrême, vraiment content car c’était un pur plaisir.

Le premier rapide: "Inverter"

 

Le lendemain à eu lieu la course freestyle. Malheureusement, les niveaux d’eau ont bien baissé et on s’est retrouvés avec un spot mi-vague, mi-rouleau. C’était assez dur de se placer pour envoyer des figures, mais on pouvait quand même faire des gros loops, des cartwheels, des blunts et des entry-moves…

Je me classe 3^ème de la course freestyle, encore une fois après avoir trop profité !

La saison des pluies est maintenant terminée dans cette région, il est temps de reprendre la route, et de découvrir d’autres activités avec ma copine. Au programme : plongée en pleine mer, saut en parachute et surf ! Mais avant, il va falloir qu’on trouve un boulot pour quelques semaines car la vie est toujours aussi chère ici. L’avantage de cette région c’est qu’il y a des plantations partout, donc je pense qu’on va aller faire du « fruit-picking » avant de reprendre la route.

A bientôt,

Max.

vidéo de l'étape finale awp world series

2011 AWP Whitewater World Series from Tribe Alliance on Vimeo.

4 big stouts in south america

This has been an amazing kayaking year in Chile! Didn’t promise to be really good because of really low water levels, but we have been killing it putting a lot of motivation on running the big ones down here. Thankfully the last weeks have been full on rain so the levels have gone crazy and we got to paddle everything! enjoy some nice pics!

top rapids in Nevados photo: Lj Groth

boofing the sickest drop of the turbio photo: Lj Groth

the scariest rapid of the upper carhuello photo: Lj Groth

Salto palguin: The first big waterfall of the trip was “salto palguin”, a super stout 80 footer with a crazy lip. I’ve ran this one 2 years ago but didn’t go too good… I boofed it, got my skirt imploded and end up swimming… this year things were different, had a great line on it and didn’t swim! Redemption feels great!

round 2 on salto palguin! redemption! photo: anne hubner

salto palguin! photo by: mathias fossum

Dirty gerd: The next big one was the “dirty gerd”, my older brother had the first descent on this one something like 5 years ago. One of the rowdiest rapids waterfalls I’ve seen In my life, super technical entrance, hard to stomp the line and crazy lines on the left and right, middle to right is the perfect line. Evan went for it first killing the entrance but missing a stroke before the lip and getting pushed all the way left, he was all right at the bottom so I decided to give it a go… I flipped in the entrance and got pushed all the way right in to the crack… anyway It was more smooth than expected and went all right! Can’t wait to go back in this one and give it the 2^nd round!!!

falling into the crack but making it down safe... stout!! photo: mathias fossum

eg layin treats on suavemente! photo: mathias fossum

Puma falls: Third one is a big one, the puma vs. cobra!! A crazy 100 footer on the river Fuy never ran before. I did the first D on February, got ejected and ate shit on it, but luckily didn’t get injured!! No one else wanted to give it a try that day, but I’m sure next year this thing is gonna go down again and again!

1st descent of puma falls (100 ft.) photo by brook larson

Salto bonito: Fourth one has been a dream for me for so long… It’s always really hard to find this one with waterSalto Bonito located in villa angostura, Argentina. It got a crazy slide entrance that reconnects with a 70 ft. fall, you are going so fast when you pass from the slide to the real drop. The four of us ran it that day, Evan, Logan, me and Fred. We made 2 groups EG and Logan went on the first one both stomping the line. Me and Fred went after them both falling enough over the bars to have one of the biggest impacts ever… Freddie landed his head on the paddle and broke his nose for the second time of his trip, good for him because after some tips of mine he got it super straight now!

dropping in to bonito photo: Logan Grayiling

This one was a sick trip where a lot of great stuff went down, lot of fun with good friends, great parties with super sexy hot chicks…. Damn can’t wait to go back someday!!! Now I am back at home after almost a year of traveling, I was kind of scared to go back but It feels good actually… But also feel that after this experience I can’t stay In any place for too long now, I’ve become a nomad…

Lot of great trips coming up this year 2012 check it all out here: aniolserrasolses.blogspot.com

Thanks to my sponsors who help me get my goals:

Sweet protection, dagger, tribe, astral buoyancy,

Aniol Serrasolses 1st descent of (100ft). Puma falls

Puma falls has always been a big one, a true 100 footer located on the river Fuy. This is the biggest waterfall ever ran In Chile. I’ve been looking at this waterfall for the last 2 years, been to that place so many times… but never had the perfect water level together with a big crew to provide a good safety/footage.

fired up crew on a high water day!

Jake Greenbaum walking through

On the 7^th of January everything changed… we got together with an awesome crew who made the 1^st descent of the falls possible! There’s a few factor that have kept many great kayakers away of running that drop. On the right side you got a pocket wall with difficult safety, If you got bad luck and your skirt implode and you swim in that direction you better start praying… also the high speed of the water at the lip is really scary… boofing this one is not an option.

I sat on the lip enough time to get fired up, not sure about how everything was going to work out, but knowing that the only way to know, was going for it… so I went!

scared and excited minutes before running the beast!

aniol riding on the lip of the falls

I sticked the entrance, not too fast and keeping my boat on the line. Didn’t take enough of a stroke because I was scared of boofing and tucked too early landing sideways and over my head.

The impact was terrible strong, so big that I got ejected right away… I tried to swim and reach the surface but took me a few seconds that felt like forever… luckily for me I got pushed to the left side where the water’s calm. I wasn’t injured and I was super stoked that everything went fine. Later on I realized that my skirt was broken in two parts…

Aniol Serrasolses 1st descent of Puma falls, rio fuy, chile

Obviously pissed because I didn’t stick the line, but in any big drop that you fuck up and you don’t get hurt, you must be really happy, so I am!

Dave Meyers ! both stoked!

We kept going with the whole crew down the middle section of the fuy, super fun rapids with a sick 40 footer waterfall! Another awesome day in our lifes!

beautiful sunset from our campspot in the rio Fuy

thank you all for the support ! Anton, Johny, David, Brooke, Logan, Lorenzo, Fred!!

Here is the teaser of Bombflow episode 8, gonna be a good one!

Ouganda 2012

A couple days ago I got home from my first 2012 trip, Uganda. After missing going to Mexico and South America together with my brother Aniol last autumn due injuries, it felt great to go away for a while.
J'ai juste rentré de mon trip à Ouganda. C'était super bien de recommencer a naviguer après sept mois de blessure… 

Camp

Dead Dutchman

After a boring autumn and early winter with lots of rest, rehab sessions and lots of medical expenses, I was finally getting better and could start with some skiing, however it was only man made snow. After some good times skiing I started to get better and I decided to go to Uganda for a month.

I left Spain on February 1^st, and after a few hours I was in Uganda, away from the cold, skiing, snow… Such a nice contrast! The level was high, so all the rapids had a nice flow to paddle them, and the waves were working well. Special was big and foamy sometimes, but green and nice on the evenings. Malalu was also pretty cool.

Kalagala

La vague était difficile car elle avait plein de mousse et c'était dur à se placer et faire des tricks, mais très bien quand même. Il y avais un très bon niveau d'eau après le barrage à Silverback est en fonctionnement alors on à pu naviguer des bons rapides comme Dead Dutchman, Hypoxia, Itanda, Kalagala et des autres plus petits…

There were so many other kayakers as well… it was hard to get some quiet times on the wave. Team mates Peter and Nina were there too along with lots of other top kayakers. However it’s lost a few good rapids after the Silverback dam project, Uganda is still one of the best winter destinations to paddle big water rapids and surf big waves. The weather is more than great, and however staying on resorts/campsites is quite expensive, you can go different. More and more paddlers are starting to stay together with the locals on their villages. It’s quite easy to get some good local fruits (papaya, avocados, tomatoes…) and it’s a good way to help out the locals and they. The kids can bring them from their home trees, and they are really tasty and fairly cheap. You can easily get everything else on the bigger villages not far away (eggs, rice, flour, sugar, bananas, potatoes…). This makes for a nice experience with more than kayaking, so you are entertained for the whole day.

Malalu; significa Loco en la lengua local, Busoga

After 5 weeks of paddling I was really sore and ready to go back home for some rest and start the Spring season. There’s no water yet, but it’s coming soon and can’t wait to start paddling here with all my friends and our local runs.

C'etait un très bon voyage pour recommencer avec de l'eau chaude et bon temps, et maintenant il faut attendre l'eau chez nous ou il y a pas plein de neige mais on va essayer d'envoyer quand  même. 

Bonne navigue à tous!

Photos by James Bebbington aka Pringle, Micha and Gerd Serrasolses

vidéo promo d'Eric

Eric Deguil Champion du monde de kayak extrême... par pyreneesextremkayak