By Teresa Gryder

[Editor’s Note: This is Part 2 of a series about holes. Part 1 is about understanding how holes are made, and learning the difference between the fun ones and the dangerous ones. This, Part 2, is about surfing in holes, which is the skill that makes it possible to get out of a hole while still in your boat. Part 3 is about swimming in holes and rescuing swimmers from holes.]

PART 2: SURFING HOLES

The first time I ever surfed a really big hole, it was completely by accident. This particular hole is in West Virginia, at the top of Koontz’s Flume on the Lower Gauley. I’d run the rapid many times before and hadn’t had trouble, but I knew there was a hole there. The hole is formed by a drop of five feet, and is a pour over type ledge hole about 15 feet wide. There’s a green tongue beside it which I missed.

I dropped over the edge, got stopped by the hole, and soon was in there surfing away. I didn’t know it, but behind me a raft trip was coming. Rafters like to run this hole because it is good clean fun. The drop is steep enough that the rafts could not see me in the seam, so they ran the drop as usual. When rafts started dropping in I scrambled back and forth in the hole, trying to avoid them.

I wasn’t getting out, but I also wasn’t getting run over. Then I realized that maybe I could get out by hitting or grabbing a raft, so I started paddling toward them as they plunged through. I finally managed to hit one with my bow, and the hole grabbed my stern and endered me out. Thank goodness I had already practiced surfing smaller holes, and enders.

GOING INTO AND OUT OF HOLES

If you never go into a hole on purpose, you won’t know what to do when you get in one by accident. If you never try to punch big holes, you won’t know how big a hole you can punch. This uncertainty leads the conservative paddler to remain ignorant of holes. It is normal to fear what you do not understand. But with a little adventurousness, understanding is within your reach.

One thing is certain. If you keep boating whitewater long enough, you will get stuck in a hole. There are sticky holes even on easy runs. It’s a good idea to learn more about holes somewhere that you feel safe and when you have good backup.

When a boat gets stuck in a hole, it gets sucked broadside into the seam between the oncoming solid water and the bubbly backwash. The trick to getting out of a hole is learning how to be in control when you are in that boat, in that seam. Side surfing in a hole is about finding your balance with the boat tilted downstream. In balance means that you can sit there with your boat tilted without having to lean on your paddle.

You keep a blade on the downstream side ready to brace, because this is the way you would rather fall if the hole bounces you around. The boat tilt keeps the upstream edge of the boat above the incoming fast water so that it does not flip you over. If you relax that edge down, the fast incoming water will grab it and you will go over so fast that it has a name from the cartoons: you get window shaded.

THE BUOY LEAN AND THE J LEAN

People will tell you to “lean downstream” in order to surf a hole. This is correct but incomplete. There are two types of leans, the buoy lean and the J lean. The buoy lean is a stiff-bodied lean, in which your hips and ribs and head don’t flex relative to each other. This is the kind of lean that gets you flipped over. The J lean is when you tilt the boat toward the side, but your head and shoulders are upright. The boat tilt needed depends on how steeply the water is falling in: a pourover needs a stronger lean than a wave hole. You don’t need a paddle to sit with your boat gently tilted and your body upright. You do need strength in your side muscles, so practice.

Every boat feels a little different, so test out your J lean on each boat that you use. Boats with secondary stability like to sit on edge. Boats with primary stability like to sit flat. When you find the balance point for your boat, try paddling around while keeping it up on edge. This fine tuned balance makes it possible for you to do interesting river running moves, like aggressive ferries and peel outs into heavy current.

If you use a one bladed paddle, you are probably good at this on one side, and not so good on the other. It’s reassuring to have that blade and strong brace on the downstream side when you’re in a hole. It’s possible to surf offside on a cross brace, but that is an advanced skill not addressed here. The other options are to switch hands, turn the boat around, or swim, which we cover in part 3.

The great thing about a J lean is that it allows you to paddle at will, either forward or backward. If you are desperately leaning on a brace you can’t paddle and you have no options. If you can get in balance without a brace, surfing is relatively easy, and you can start figuring out how to do tricks. Your shoulders will also be much safer. You have the freedom to paddle on both sides of the boat, albeit cautiously on the upstream side. Voila! Holes aren’t so scary, long as they have edges. Perhaps the most important thing about getting out of a side surf is to stay in balance so you can conserve energy.

When you’re in a hole, keep breathing! Put your weight on the downstream knee or butt cheek, and keep your paddle poised to brace on the downstream side. If you start to fall over to the downstream side, you drop your head in a “head dink” brace (see video link at end) and right yourself. If you start to flip over to the upstream side, tuck fast, because there’s a rock in there. Many holes will spit you out if you can just keep yourself together long enough. A bouncy hole might toss you out. It is also might flip you over. One great thing about flipping over in a hole is that it is really easy to roll up.

THE SLINGSHOT METHOD

Sometimes a frowning hole will have edges that are actually uphill from the middle of the hole. There’s a trick to getting out of these. I call it the slingshot method. What you do is paddle yourself all the way to one edge of the hole. If you can’t get out that edge, paddle fast across the hole to the other edge, and bust out that side. If that fails, sling shot it back to the first side. Sitting in one spot is just as tiresome as rocking it, so get your boat moving. The more speed you can generate going across the hole, the better your odds are of blasting out.

ENDER OUT

Another way to escape from a hole while still in your boat is to ender out. This works better for decked boats than for canoes, but canoeists have done it! To ender out you have to get your boat perpendicular to the seam. This isn’t always easy to do. I collided with a raft to get my boat out of the seam. Sometimes you can get one end free by paddling it out the edge of the hole. Sometimes you can rudder on the upstream side, or sweep on the downstream side, and get one end of your boat out of the seam.

Most often the hole just pulses and throws you partway out. At this moment you have options. You can either try to paddle downstream (which is most people’s instinct), or you can plow your boat back upstream into the incoming green water. It doesn’t matter which end goes back upstream: a backender is just as good as a front ender for getting out of holes. Either way you shoot up into the air and possibly out of the hole.

Recently we were looking at the hole on river right at the bottom of Revenue Rapid on the Sandy River. At 1200 cfs it looks similar to the hole on the left at the bottom of Nantahala falls. It’s strong enough to stop you, and one edge is against the shore where you cannot paddle out of it. The other edge, however, points downstream. If you were surfing in that hole, you could ride it out of the edge that feeds downstream, or get a huge ender there. There was a time when I spent my lunch hours doing enders in a hole like that.

HOLES YOU CAN’T PADDLE OUT OF

There are some holes that you cannot paddle out of. Those are the dangerous ones, like low head dams, that have no edges to go out of, and a powerful upstream backwash. When you’re upstream of such a horizon, you won’t see any current going downstream below it. Beware!! Take heed of signage!! This is a good time to pull over to the side of the river and portage, or at least scout. Low head dams and some natural ledges form holes that you could need a rope rescue to escape from. More about this next time.

YOUR CONTINUING EDUCATION

For now, I hope that you will practice your J lean on flat water, first sitting still, then paddling forward and backward. Once you’ve gotten comfortable doing that, it’s time to find a small hole and try side surfing! The ocean is a great place to play with side surfing—in the “soup” (already broken waves). You might even find that you like it.

Here’s a few videos to really help you see and understand the concepts covered here.

This young man makes the J lean look very easy and teaches the head dink.

Old school whitewater rodeo was mostly about hanging on for the ride. This open canoe at Phil’s Hole in 2009 is a good example, and here’s more rodeo at Phil’s.

New school whitewater rodeo is more about doing moves, illustrated well by the 360’s in this soft wave hole (see the window shading at 8:00), this Ocoee rodeo, and our very own David Pool at Kelly’s play park in Idaho.

See also this two minute ride at Kelly’s play park which ends when the kayaker takes two decisive forward strokes. And this sticky hole at Tappan Falls on the Middle Fork Salmon which held a raft for eight minutes, but thankfully not the swimmers.

Part 1 in this series is about understanding which holes are fun and which are dangerous, and Part 3 is about swimming, both self rescue and the rescue of others.

Hole Escape Skills