4 hour inm and just over 40 km, 10.9 kph ave. Wind has picked up a bit but from the south which makes for bigger waves at my end of the lake. But this is typically the windy part of the day, so I just need to get through this. Should calm down tonight. Feeling good, but stupid Achilles is. Starting to hurt a bit
Sent from my BlackBerry device on the Rogers Wireless Network

Hey everyone. Greg here from the blackberry. About 2 hour in and about 11 kph ave. The water is like glass. Lucked out with the weather so far
Sent from my BlackBerry device on the Rogers Wireless Network

At 9:30:00 Greg started his 24 hours and his first couple of laps have been done. Have a look at the progress on the chart below.

Link to Spreadsheet

CP2 is now finally finished and ready to set a world record! I leave for Whitefish, Montana tomorrow and if the weather cooperates, the record attempt will start at 9:00 am on Monday morning. Make sure you tune into this web page for up to the minute reports on my progress.

I had some decals made for CP2:

The course and some last minute changes

The map above shows my probable course on Whitefish Lake that measures about 6 km around. Skip – my right hand man in Whitefish has a house on the lake and is out most mornings in his row boat. He really knows the lake and has made an excellent suggestion for a very protected route along the west shore. The prevailing winds over the lake are usually from the South and West, so the mountain along the south and west shore shelters the water. The photo below was taken from Skips house a few minutes ago. Note the strip of glass water along the far shore. That will be my lane.

I ran some tests on Glenmore with my small rudder compared to the large rudder and the smaller rudder was definitely faster (about 0.1 kph faster, or 2.4 km over 24 hours). The problem with the small rudder is my turn radius is very large, and if I were to get into some wind at some point during the day, I have a very hard time controlling CP2 with the minuscule 1″ x 4″ rudder.

The new mid-sized rudder. The brown stuff is bondo

I also tested out the flip-down kayak rudder. The idea is that I use the small rudder to maintain my course, then flip down the large bolt-on rudder for turns. This doesn’t work as well as it needs to. Because both rudders are in the water at the same time during turns, the turns are very draggy and slow.

So, I decided the best solution would be to use a permanent rudder that is half-way between my tiny knife blade rudder and the large one. So, I cut the big one down to about 1/2 the size and polished it up to a shine.

I tested the new rudder, and my new prop that Manny kindly made for me after my other one broke off and fell into Glenmore reservoir. The test was in exact RACE-DAY configuration and the results were VERY good. The water was very calm and I was able to record 10.7 kph on 120 watts which is the highest speed so far (for 120 watts).

Manny’s sweet CNC propeller

The new rudder is VERY sensitive, and as a result, I found that I had to make tiny course corrections very often. I found this a bit annoying, so when I got home I decided to change my steering handle from the bottom side to the GPS mount. Because I am so used to steering the M5 recumbent with my arms out and in front, I find that on long CP2 training rides, I like to place my hands on top of the GPS which is mounted on an aluminum tube that places the GPS in front of my face so that I can see my course and track at night.

I added two handle bars to the GPS mount, then added a lever to turn the steering cable. It seems to work great and I can steer just like the M5 without having to constantly lower my right hand down to the old lever. The bolt that secures the steering line to the lever is secured with a thumbscrew and it can easily be removed and the cable moved back to the old handle if need be.

I got up early this morning to get the calm water at Glenmore before the wind started howling. I met up with my sis Theresa who happened to be running by the rowing club where I was setting up CP2.

Today’s training ride was to get a feel for my ‘race configuration’ speed and make a decision rudder or not to use the new bigger rudder or my tiny knife blade. Contrary to what you see in these photos, the water was NOT calm. 4 to 5 inch waves with a 10 wind, but at least it was consistent for the test.

The results were that the larger rudder was .1 km/hr slower than the small rudder at 120 watts out and back runs, and 170 watt out and back runs. Here is the data:

• 2-3 inch waves, large rudder, 120 watts = 10.3 km/hr
• 2-3 inch waves, small rudder, 120 watts = 10.4 km/hr
  
• 3-4 inch waves, small rudder, 170 watts = 11.7 km/hr
  
• 4-5 inch waves, large rudder, 170 watts = 11.6 km/hr
  

.1 km/hr works out to a whopping 2.4 km over 24 hours, but since I am killing myself for every single kilometer, I guess that the small rudder will stay. The reason I am testing out a slightly larger rudder is because I need to stay tight to my buoy marked course. The small rudder won’t allow me to turn as tight as I need. The alternative is to go back to my flip-down kayak rudder that I stole from my Mirage drive Hobie Adventure.

The flip-down unit weighs 1.8 pounds and is only used when making a turn. When I am going straight, I use my small rudder to keep on track. I calculated that the weight of the flip-down rudder would cost me about 1.5 km over 24 hours which is less than the 2.4 km cost of having a larger rudder permanently in the water all the time.

I am splitting hairs here, as there is only a .9 km difference between the two approaches. I guess the deciding factor will be that if I go with the flip down rudder I have a built-in back-up for my rudder if something were to go wrong – like if my regular rudder just fell off or dissolved into thin air or got eaten by the Ogopogo or something.

At this point, I know of only 4 ways to make Critical Power 2 faster for my attempt at the 24 hour human powered boat distance record on September 8th, 2008:

1. Increase my power output over 24 hours
2. CALM water
3. Reduce the weight of CP2
4. Stay very close to course markers and keep the angle between buoys as wide as possible.

In response to item #1 (fitness) – I have been training my ass off and I do plan on increasing my average power output by 10%

In response to item#2 (calm water) – One of the reasons I am planning the attempt at Whitefish Lake in Montana is because it is a large lake and there are always areas of the lake that are sheltered by mountains depending on the direction of wind. I am hopeful that we can pick a day during the week of September 8 to 12th where there is a favorable wind forecast and from a direction that has shelter.

In response to item#3 (reduce weight) – I have shaved 10 pounds off Critical Power 2. Less weight means less displacement in the water and a correspondingly faster speed. Rick and I calculated that 10 lbs of weight reduction would be worth about 3.6 additional kms in 24 hours. It doesn’t sound like much but I will need every INCH I can get.

The place I started was the floats. When I first made the carbon shells for the floats they leaked like sieves so we filled them up with expanding foam. The expanding foam expanded more that I expected and it stretched out the side walls. It was also quite heavy weighing in a 4.5 pounds per float.

I hired composites expert Dave Houbrechts to hollow the floats out, insert some Corecell bulkheads, water proof the skin, and top-off with a Corecell top deck. He did a fantastic job! They are now as narrow as they were originally supposed to be and weigh in at 1.6 pounds each.

Next, I replaced the aluminum floats strut with a carbon version. I ordered two carbon tubes and joined them together using a sleeve. To fix the strut to the floats I bonded a carbon sleeve tube to each float. The floats slide onto the strut tube and are clamped down to the tube with some aluminum bolts and washers.

The outrigger strut slides into a sleeve that is bonded to the float. Aluminum bolts through the flange on the floats clamp down the on strut tube to hold the floats tight and level

The outrigger strut fits to the top deck with two wood standoffs and aluminum bolts

I also fabricated a new rudder steer clamp with aluminum and replaced all of the stainless steel fasteners with aluminum fasteners.

And finally, I am well on my way to reducing the weight of the engine itself from 156 pounds to 150 pounds. Overall, this should result in a 15 pound weight reduction which should equate to about 6 km over 24 hours.

In response to item #4 (stay tight to course) – another potential source of drag is veering too far away from my course markers during turns. My tiny 1″ wide x 4″ long rudder is just too small and won’t allow me to stay as close to my turn buoys as I need to. I made a new rudder than is about 2 times bigger than the old one. I need to test this to make sure that there is no substantial additional drag, but there was hardly any difference between my backup very large rudder and the tiny one. I would expect that the increase in drag this medium sized rudder adds would be insignificant, whereas my ability to control CP2 around the markers would be vastly improved.

Remember that on September 8th (or the best weather day from Sept 8th to Sept 12th), you can follow my progress by tuning into this blog. Each blog post will feature the following “24 hour progress dashboard”:

Also don’t forget to enter the free Nomad hand held computer contest by predicting my finishing distance (online entry form at the blog to the right).

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I was away last week in Durham, North Carolina delivering my son Cody to Duke University where he will be joining the Duke Blue Devils diving team and getting through his first year of computer science. We got him moved into his dorm, acquired his first term books, toured the campus, registered with various offices, got him cards, keys, cell phone account, etc, etc.

Cody and Krista in Cody’s dorm room at Duke

It was a bit of a stressful week and a bitter sweet time for Helen and I. We are very sad to see Cody move away, but we’re thrilled and excited about this new opportunity for him.

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A huge shout-out and congratulations to my two buddies Greg Bradley and Bryon Howard who both smoked Ironman Canada yesterday. Greg achieved one of his long term goals to break 10 hours and Bryon blasted out a 9:45 for 3rd place in his division and a qualifying slot for Kona!

Killer whale in Johnston Straight, Vancouver Island, BC

Helen and I, along with our good friends Val and Gary Erickson just returned from a 5 day camping/kayaking trip through Johnston Straight in northern Vancouver Island. It was a rough, wet, cold, dirty but AWESOME week! We saw Killer Whales every day – amazing. To do a trip like this once a year is nourishment for the soul.

Johnston straight is shown on the map above.
We had to take a 2.5 hour water taxi boat ride from
Campbell River, BC to our camp in the rain forest.

Helen and I in the tent

Helen in her kayak

Helen and Val and kayak on a misty morning

Helen and Val and our guide with a Sunstar

Vancouver Island is amazingly beautiful

Bald Eagle

Bald Eagle eating a Salmon

Gary and Greg back to civilisation

Training and the record attempt

A date and location has been set for the record attempt. Monday September 8th on Whitefish Lake in Montana. My man Skip Schloss has kindly volunteered to act as the event organizer for me. He has a house with a dock on the lake and many friends and contacts in the Whitefish area. I’ll post more details later when I get more time.

Today i finish a 4 day heavy volume training period where I will complete a total of 24 hour of race-pace pedalling on Glenmore Reservoir here in Calgary. I did 10 hours straight, non-stop on Wednesday and finished with a 10.9 kph average speed. 10.2 kph is required to match Carter Johnson’s current 24 hour kayaking record.

On Thursday I experimented with a slower pace and managed to end my 5 hour day with an average speed of 10.4 kph. Compared to the average power I had to maintain for 10.9 kph, 10.4 kph is a FAR more efficient pace.

I calculated that it took 25% more power on Wednesday’s 10.9 kph effort to produce only 4.8% more speed on Thursday’s 10.4 kph effort. My strategy will be to conserve as much as I can during the first 12 hours be being as efficient as possible with low power output, then slowly increase the power through the night until morning if possible.

On Thursday I lost my prop when my shaft broke! OH NO!!! Since I am not using a strut to hold the prop, when the shaft breaks, the prop falls to the bottom of the lake. I marked the location by dropping a way point on my GPS, but accidentally errased it. The lake is VERY weedy and dirty where it fell, so diving in to find it probably isn’t possible. Also if I get caught in the water I will get fined because you are not allowed to swim in the reservoir. Since I didn’t have a paddle with me I started to paddle with my hands, but quickly realized that I wasn’t going anywhere. Luckily one of the rowing coaching boats was near and the two girls (who I see EVERYDAY out there on the lake) kindly gave me a ride and tow back to the dock. I have a spare prop, but now I need to ask Manny to CNC machine me one more. I hate asking because he is so busy right now with PAYING work.

Fridays 5 hour ride was without the SRM power meter because the battery died, so I wasn’t able to monitor my power output. I ended at 10.4 kph average speed and included a bunch of pauses for this and that and varying intensities and speeds throughout the day.

Today’s final ride will be harder because I want to try to stress my muscles after 3 days of heavy miles and fatigue. I’m thinking of aiming for 180 to 200 watts for 5 hours, and an average speed above 11.4 kh.

Contest

Don’t forget that you can enter to win a free Nomad hand held computer by correctly predicting my finishing distance during the 24 hour record attempt. As more information about my speed and training results become available to you, you can revise your prediction as many times as you like by re-entering the contest. We will take your LATEST entry as your official prediction and the contest will close on Sept 8th.

Here is the online entry form:

CreatePublishFrame3(‘71077′,’VXNlcklkPTcxMDc3LkZvcm1JZD0x’,’175′,’230′,’www.formlogix.com’,’https’);

Check out this cool high-tech GPS gear I got from my friends at Trimble and Geneq!

The SXBlue from Geneq is a high precision GPS that delivers sub-meter positioning accuracy and low power consumption. It uses a new GPS engine architecture that provides faster startup and acquisition times. the SXBlue will be mounted on CriticalPower2 and will transmit my position via a XTend radio frequency modem to a receiver unit tat is connected to my Trimble Nomad hand held computer which will accurately map and log my position.

Greg Bradley holds the reciever unit with
the antena mounted on a fiberglass rod.

On board CP2, I will use my Trimble Nomad running GPS software to collect redundant data and so that I can see where I am on the moving map. The Genec GPS will not only transmit my position to the ground based unit via radio, but simultaneously broadcast my GPS coordinates via Bluetooth to the Nomad which I will have in front of me as I make my way around the lake. Very slick.

This is the transmitter unit mounted behind the seat of CP2.
The GPS antennae is on the top of the Genec cap I am wearing.
They call me Super Geek.

The transmitter unit will be powered by four 7200 Ma Lithium Polymer batteries connected in parallel which will give me about 30 hours of continuous use.
The photo above shows my charging station.

The rules

According to the Guinness World Record guidelines for “GREATEST DISTANCE BY A PEDAL POWERED BOAT IN 24 HOURS”, an acceptable method of measuring my distance is:

“The progress of the journey must be tracked using timed GPS position reports which are transmitted to a separate station. The onward transmission may be via Inmarsat, Argos or another system capable EITHER of collecting the data and automatically forwarding it at preset intervals OR of being polled by the base station (or both). The essential feature is that the timed GPS position reports must be collected and forwarded without any action by the participant. The data collected in this way must be submitted with the record claim and must be certified as being true and accurate by the person/persons manning this station. “

The alternative method of measuring distance which is also accepted by Guinness is the old fashioned surveyed buoy course and counting laps.

The International Human Powered Vehicle Association is reviewing the GPS distance measuring method. They suggest that using the GPS to measure a pre-existing marked course might be acceptable, but to freely wonder around the lake using the GPS to measure my distance would be against the spirit of the competition. I would have to agree to some extent.

To satisfy both Guinness and IHPVA, I may have to revert to counting laps of a professional surveyed marked course like I did during last years HPB record attempt for HPVA, and use the GPS distance for the Guinness record.

New modifications to CP2

In Whitefish I noticed that I had problems making tight turns in windy conditions so I stole the flip-down rudder off of my Hobie Adventure Mirage drive kayak and installed it on CP2. It works VERY well. When I need to turn a corner, I just pull a cord and flip down the large rudder. To make small adjustments to my course, I use my small efficient rudder.

Check this sweet elliptical chain ring out:

This is an elliptical chain ring made for me by my buddy Matt Cochran at Kittadyne. As you can see in the photo, the chain ring is not round, but oval. I rotate the ring such that the widest diameter of the oval coincides with my optimal pedal torque position. This tends to better simulate the momentum of a road bike. Riding the round ring on the boat is like pedalling your bike with the breaks on and the elliptical ring relocates more of the torque to my power position, and less to the part of the pedal stroke that doesn’t do much work. It seems to work great and after 10 brutal hours on the lake yesterday, me knee seems to be a lot better. I’ll post results of my training run in the next update.

my new serious haircut

We were in Whitefish, Montana at our cabin for the weekend and I got in two great days of 8 hours straight, non stop in CriticalPower2 on Whitefish Lake.

The good news is that the conditions were way less than favorable and I still managed to end above record pace each day. I also found that because the lake is so big, that if you know what direction the wind is coming from you can go to that side of the lake and get calm water.

On Sunday I was on the north side of the 10 km long lake enjoying flat, calm, glass-like conditions when the water on the south side was rolling with 2 to 3 foot waves! By mid-afternoon the waves on the south end would swamp my hull from the tip of the bow all the way back to behind my seat. I got soaked and CP2 took on so much water through the seams that I couldn’t lift her out of the water.

On Fridays ride the wind picked up in the afternoon while I was en route back to the south dock and I got blown to shore and had to jump in and drag CP2 onto the beach. I waited for 20 minutes until it calmed down a bit and re-launched. Made it back to the main dock safe and sound. On Sunday I used my large rudder which made ALL the difference with control in the rough water. With the large rudder on (slower due to increased drag), I spent about 50% of the day in waves and wind I was still able to maintain an average of 10.4 kph (10.2 required for record). My small rudder is more efficient, but I can’t use the small rudder in large waves – just not enough control. The large rudder worked really well.

Sunrise on Whitefish lake

I think I can do the record attempt at Whitefish lake. According to rower Skip Schloss and a few fisherman I spoke to, it was unusually windy for the weekend there. But even with that wind, I was still able to find large areas that were very sheltered. On Friday the wind was from the south west and I had the entire 10 km west side that I used that was very calm. On Sunday the wind was from the north and the north tip of the lake was very calm. On a typical calm day, I would expect that there could be many calm areas. I was also told that the ski boats disappear mid-August when school starts back again. I found that the waves from the boats don’t effect me as much as I though they would. There were dozens of motor boats all around me on Sunday, and I didn’t see my speed being effected that much from them. The wakes are large and rolling, not choppy. I think additional skin friction is caused by small, scattered waves, not by large rolling smooth waves.

I think that a large, retractable rudder for turning would be beneficial. When I was looping around the North end of the lake, I found that I could do a fairly tight turn and stay in the calm water easier with the large rudder than I could with my small blade. When I was touring the west side of the lake on Friday, my turns with the small rudder took me way out into the middle of the lake which was fairly wavy. The small blade is more efficient for keeping on track though.

I borrowed the retractable rudder from my Hobie Mirage drive kayak and I want to install it on the stern of CP2. When I need to turn around at the end of the lake, I’ll just flip down the large rudder, do my turn, then flip it back up again. I think this would be more efficient in the long run than doing HUGE wide turns with the small rudder and risking drifting into windy, wavy conditions.

After I finished shooting this video I found a plastic bag in my waste pouch and placed the camera into the bag. A minute later the wind and waves pushed me into shore. I had to jump out and swim to shore with CP2 in tow. I landed on PGA pro player Tyler Erickson’s beach. He kindly offered me a ride to the main dock, but I was able to push off after a few minutes when conditions calmed a bit. Thanks anyhow Tyler – nice to meet you!

Early morning on Whitefish Lake

This is rather encouraging.

I have analyzed and calculated and ran numbers in every combination and permutation regarding my chances to break Carter Johnson’s 242 km surfski 24 hour distance record. So far, to be brutal honest with you, I have not been totally convinced that I can do it. Carter is a formidable opponent and it is very difficult to beat the simple efficiency of a Surfski kayak and a paddle.

Is my boat fast enough? Am I physically capable? Both really important questions, and both difficult to answer independently.

Typical afternoon thunder boomers rolling in

However, I found a way to directly compare man and machine. I found a YouTube video of Carter doing a 4 minute, 11 second thousand meter sprint in the same Surfski kayak that he used to set the 24 hour HPB distance record. I figured that if my fitness and my boat were both up to the challenge, I should also be able to complete a 1000 meter sprint in about the same time. And I did – 4 minutes, 11 seconds exactly.

Below are the two YouTube videos – the top one showing Carter finishing his 4:11 sprint in his Surfski kayak and below that, me finishing my 4:11 sprint in Critical Power 2 human powered boat.

I haven’t been training these short bursts, so my sprint interval power is probably down from what it used to be, but I was able to complete a few very painful 1000 meter intervals between 4:11 and 4:16. My interval was also interrupted by some waves from the SS Moyie paddle boat, and my prop striking the hull near the end of the interval when I was pushing out over 400 watts to finish. I am certain that I could shave at least 11 seconds off with some additional training – which would probably be good for me anyhow.

I think this is a fair comparison and at the very least, it provides me with some level of confidence that I should be able to go at least 242 km in 24 hours with the assumption that my long distance endurance is at least equal to Carters.

I have postponed the 24 hour record attempt until later in August to allow me more time to find a lake and get organized. We’re off to our cabin in Whitefish, MT this week and I am planning for some epic long training days on Whitefish Lake and maybe even Flathead lake with CP2.

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I just had an email conversation with Jeff Potter about what exactly we are hoping to prove to the world by beating a simple kayak with a complicated pedal and propeller powered boat. Jeff really makes me think about the bigger picture. I get so immersed in my challenge that I sometimes lose site of why any of it matters at all.

If the record is a vast improvement over the kayak, then we could certainly state that our system is simply a better way of travelling on water by human power. It’s not that simple, and I really doubt that if I break the record, it would be by a substantial amount – however, 1 km over the current record in my books at this point *IS* substantial! A kayak is simple, light weight, and inexpensive. It can be dragged up a beach and generally weeds don’t effect it’s forward progress much. There isn’t much to break on it and you can paddle in shallow water because the draft is so small. The pedal powered boat is none of the above.

A pedal powered boat does have it’s merits though – The advantages might be equal efficiency to a surfski – but I would say more comfortable to more people for longer distances than paddling. It also frees up the arms for fishing, or reading, or whatever. Most of the rowers tell me they would kill to be able to use their hands and arms during a long rowing journey.

The technology we develop in pedal powered boats, however, has far greater importance than for what Joe Sixpak wants to tool around in on the weekend. Because we are developing a means to power a boat (or a road vehicle for that matter) that does not rely on large oars or paddles extending from the hull, we have a way to make our boats more aerodynamic for wind and weather sheltering for the rider(s). On long journeys, this is substantial (as PedalTheOcean hopes to prove).

For the advancement of energy efficient water transportation, what we are developing with our pedal powered boats is DIRECTLY APPLICABLE to that end – whereas, paddle powered boats are not (I doubt anyone would be interested in pursuing a solar powered rowing boat). An adequate solar panel on CP2 would probably be the most energy efficient boat on the planet. I’m not sure how you could use a solar panel on a Surfski.

I’ve said this before – Human power is about the pursuit of doing more with less rather than our current way of always trying to do more with more. Someone calculated that a gas engine in Critical Power would demonstrate fuel efficiency of over 10,000 miles per gallon.

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I would like to extend a HUGE congratulations to Carter Johnson who recently won the men’s solo division of the Missouri 340 kayak river race. Carter finished the race in 37 hours, 46 minutes. Johnson’s time is record-setting for this race, now in its third year. He finished more than eight hours faster than the winner in the men’s solo division last year. WOW!

Carter Johnson during the 2007 Texas Water Safarai
Image courtesy of FitToPaddle.com