Lincoln September Event

Thursday 21 Sep 2023 | by Hannah Stockdale

It was a bustling morning before the start of Lincoln’s AquaPaddle on Sunday (17th Sept). Karen completed the route check on the glassy water whilst we put out the flags, banners and notice board ready for paddlers arriving.

With lots of new paddlers registered again the crew were on hand to welcome everyone and introduce themselves and show paddlers to the board park and safety briefing. Peter discovered a leak in his board but was quickly loaned another board so he could still take part.

After a quick introduction explaining the aims and ethos AquaPaddle, Captain Griff takes over to give the safety briefing and ensure everyone know the route, has the correct kit and their AquaPaddle bib or number.

Then its time for everyone to get on the water and head to the start. Its all paddle boards again, we hope to get more mixed crafts entering in future.

A few minutes after the start comes a radio call that someone is retiring as their paddle has snapped. Crew to the rescue and Griff runs up the towpath to grab a spare paddle for Vanessa. The radios allow us to tell Sweep Ben that she is going to continue and he paddles back towards where she stopped. Despite now being a good 5 minutes behind everyone else it’s clear she is someone who likes a challenge and she paddles hard to catch the pack up.

The rest of the paddle passess without incident (well perhaps a small splash was heard somewhere near Becky at one point!).

Everyone completes the course in a good time with some great PBs, RobL got under 46 minutes despite the head wind, Paul cut an amazing 20 minutes off his previous time, with Nutty dropping 18 minutes off his. Liza, Becky, Charlie, Tim and Mick all improved their times by over 5 minutes each. Sara beat her previous time which was on an inflatable kayak and said she is never paddling the kayak again.

Our thanks to the volunteer crew and all who attended the event.

Now on to the video and photos….. (photos by HannahS, KarenM, AndreaB, Rob, BeckyW, VanessaA)