Run of the Charles relay, leg 1, with the Quinobequin Canoe Club, lineup:
1) J-J and Don
2) Murray and Wes
3) Julie and Rob
4) Derek and Gus
5) Don (redux) and Wes (redux)
It was a wave start with a bunch of groups two minutes apart, and we were in at least the fourth wave, so there were a few boats that we weren't able to overtake. It was a real demolition derby at times; we had four or five collisions (sideswipes) or near-misses. One was an aluminum boat that did a 90 degree turn right in front of us, and we just managed to put on the brakes enough to avoid T-boning it. The river was low, but we got through pretty well, just hitting one bad stretch of suckwater on the inside of a curve (our second leg ran aground three times, and Wes had to get out of the boat once).
Our nemeses are the Snoopers and the Biolabs Mutants, who are both in a different division (corporate), but still in the same race. They started in waves after us, but the Snoopers had strong paddlers on leg 1 and made up four minutes on us. We gained some back on the second leg, then they passed us on the third, and our fourth leg team couldn't quite catch them. Our anchor legs guys caught up to them before they even hit the water, on the portage around the Moody St. dam, and had gained back 90 seconds of the 4-minute deficit by the Bleachery. In the end, I guess I wasn't too much of a handicap to the team, because things turned out
okay.