8m in my garage

This evening I got my first closer look at Yancy Scroggins' work he did for Jerico last year. It is obviously not in a finished, painted condition. I will be adding pedestals, brackets, two seats, and the drive system. Then we will strip off the removable items for a paint job. It will represent the beautiful work that Rick designed and Yancy built utilizing his incredible shop I had the privilege to visit just a year and a half ago. 

It is a meter shorter than the Third Wheel and is ready to handle less displacement than it as well. It is slightly narrower and not as deep as the Third Wheel. (It is designed for just two pedaler's) 

Incredibly light. The Third wheel hull (with pedestals and brackets) weighed in at 101 pounds. The 8m hull is starting at 31 pounds (without pedestals and brackets). 

It is staggering. 

Great job Yancy! We will get it to a finished quality soon enough. 

The Third Endeavor: the beginnings

Last year as I was planning to start the build for the third wheel, I gave a story behind how we had gotten to that point. 

Who is that? Here is a summary from last year:

Tim: He was my partner from the 7th MR340 who for many reasons has become and him and his family will be long standing friends. 

Rob: He has been my partner in more weekend expeditions than anyone. We have paddled the navagatable lengths of the Jacks Fork, the Finley, the James (to lake water), the Beaver, the Swan, the North Fork, the Buffalo (from Ponca to White), sections of the Missouri, and many other small trips. Also could be easily considered part of the family and Henry's best bud. 

Liz: She is my wife, two time ground crew captain, full of grace, patience, sounding board, partner in The Race to the Dome, and support in all I become obsessed over. 

Henry: He is my son, my biggest little helper in the shop, and always inspiring. 

Jerico: He is a connection I have made along the way in this process of HPB. He has a seemingly endless supply of building/ machining experience, continues to share ideas/thoughts/plans/time, encouraging, and uplifting. He calls his home near the Missouri River. 

Rick W.: He will be referred to a large amount of the time. He lives in Australia.  In every way that aspiring builders like myself attempt to forge a path toward efficient ways to travel on water, Rick has either done it, researched it, wrote about it, or developed it. I gave a tiny nod to Rick on a previous FAQ, but this entire project is going because of his work and his generosity. He has developed and redeveloped systems to work the best for HPB. He is the developer, designer, guide, and in some items, manufacturer of the V-16. He will be my guide as we continue to build and outfit the first three man version of his design. 

Greg: He is an overall stud in the world of endurance. He holds the current record for distance traveled on flat water for a pedal drive boat. His endurance accolades move on from there. This year he has his sights set for Carter's solo record in the MR340. He set his record in an earlier version of Rick's design and will be bringing it from the now chilly north air of Canada to the race this summer. 

I know more people will be involved in this project and it will be an incredible help as we push forward. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is the story for this year: The Third Endeavor.

Liz: she is still my incredible wife yet she is been up to more lately as she is soon to give birth to our second son, Charlie. She was bummed out last year that she could not fill in as the Rollo ground crew for the third year, but she did follow along and act as our virtual groundcrew from Springfield.

Jerry: as stated above Jerico has been a big part of the third wheel and now my partner in the third endeavor. Jerico and I are joining forces as we attack this years MR 340 as a tandem pedal drive. We are not using the third wheel. We are converting his 8m Rick designed, Yancy built, solar electric boat into a two-man pedal drive.  Jerico is going to take the third wheel and turn it into a solar electric boat for the E340. The work on these two projects start tomorrow as I am taking the third wheel up to Jerico and bringing back the 8m. 

Greg K: Greg loved his voyage down the MR 340 last year so much with his wife, Helen, as his groundcrew, that they are attacking the river together this year in the newly built special K tandem pedal drive. They completed over 100 miles of training just this week alone on the thawed out lakes in Canada. There always inspiring and always driving forward between their ultramarathons and now together in a river ultramarathon.

Rick: Rick is just as involved this year as last year. He has sent me new goodies that will be a lighter more reliable version of ways to set up the boat that he's developed over his summer that is just now coming to close in Australia. He is always developing always moving forward and ready to help drive the sport forward.

Much more to come…

2015 MR340

After signing up weeks ago and temporarily slotting myself in Solo Pedal Drive, I now have a plan. 

Jerry, who helped me in many ways last year, built a solar electric boat for last year's E340. It is the 8m two man design of Rick Willoghby. 

Now he is converting it into a two man and I am giving the race a shot in yet another type of boat: Tandem recreational canoe; Hobie Solo pedal drive; home built Third Wheel 2 pedal one paddle (V16-9m); and now in a V16-8m. 

Let the obsessing commence...

Reeves

One Week! (again)

Coincidentally, Bare Naked Ladies are coming to perform this week in Springfield. 

We are about as ready as we will be. The hull is upside down in the workshop waiting on a few touch up spots. I have a few tweaks I'd like to take care of with the strut pivots and the rudder control. Everything else is going to run as is for the race. Any efforts to make it pretty now will not change performance. It is ready to roll. 

Dwayne is pumped. A little background on my connection with Dwayne:

We first officially met during the Race for the Rivers two years ago when I was testing out the Hobie for the first time. It was a windy day. It did not effect me as much as my brother in his sea kayak. It definitely effected Dwayne on his SUP. That weekend started my connection with the now defunct STL Sail and Paddle and came some time after his connection had ended. Following that race, Dwayne and I have caught up from time to time including a solid workout on bikes through Pere Marquette park. Dwayne, Tim, and I probably go back to a deeper connection from 2012 when we  finished the 340 in reasonable proximity. We may have shared time on the river side by side. Dwayne was a solo that year, but has also acted as ground crew for Shane Perrin in racing events as well as expeditions. He brings endurance, experience, and passion to the team. 

Cheers

We have a new team!

Third Wheel update! 

Tim got the job he was after, so he is out this year. Rob Smith and I are still in due to the graciousness of our respective work places. Dwayne VanHoose is joining us to round out the team. We will definitely have a good time and maybe finish in a good time too. 

On this, his second time participating in the 340,  (and ground crew for Shane Perrin) he doesn't feel that 340 miles of pedaling and paddling is enough, so he is Biking all of his gear to the train station, riding the train across the state, then riding to the start. Then biking home from the finish. I feel like I would bum a ride. 

Less than two weeks until race day and we have a plan. 

Dwayne VanHoose:

Rob Smith:

Scott Reeves: 

Different kind of plan

The August race is on for me and the Third Wheel. My principal approved my missing the first week of school to attend. It is bittersweet for Tim. He was hired for the new job. Awesome news, but now unavailable for the maiden 340 for Third Wheel. Rob and I are still involved and a third is being recruited. More news on that as it develops. 

More photos to come soon as we are going to get some more training runs in in the coming days. I included some from a solo training.

Cheers!

All dressed up, and nowhere to go.

The paint all went on smooth, this time. We were getting fully rigged when we got the news that the race start was postponed until Wednesday. This was not terrible because it have us a bit more time to get everything organized. 

Why postponed? The river was up already due to rains in the upper plains and a water release from the reservoir in South Dakota. We were going to be right on the edge of going. Scott Mansker, the race director, and the team made the tough decision to postpone 24 hours to get onto the backside of the flood crest that was hitting. There was a storm coming Monday night through Tuesday morning that was going to expand the river in its banks. A high Missouri River or at flood stage is dangerous because there is nowhere to go if you need to get off of the water. Not as many safe landings, no wing dikes to take shelter behind, and debris in the river to avoid. 

As the weather forecast progressed, so did the National Hydrolical prediction for river levels. By 11am yesterday, it was clear that the race would not be starting. What a tough and brilliant decision by Scott and the staff. It is of course disappointing to not be able to take Third Wheel out for the race, but lives may have been save with that decision. Everyone has a story of how much time, money, traveling, and effort they put into the MR340 this year. It is the right decision. The storm did come as predicted. The river is swelling in its banks. The race is rescheduled for August. 

It is tough, but not foreign to Tim and I. We went through this our first and second year of attempts. 2010 was a situation close to this week. Rain put it over the top. We could not do the August reschedule. 2011 was a flood year and was clearly going to be backed up. It was rescheduled to August, then September, then finally ran in October (still with high water). We did not want to test hypothermia and again work found itself in the way. 

Tim and I finished in 2012 with low water. I finished well as a solo in 2013 with lower water. 

I'm not fully counting August 12 out of the question for me in the race. We have intentionally not discussed it yet. I do know a few things though: 

1a. Liz and I will not be doing the race together this year. The race falls on the first week of school. Meetings MTW, then students on ThF. Liz is starting at a new school this year and I could not ask her to not have the opportunities to build those relationships. 

1b. Laura will be returning to her school and prepping and starting the year off right is huge for student success (especially in elementary).

1c. I return to the same SPED program with only one new student. If is plays able that I could get away with missing the first two days. I have some personal days saved up. It will be up to me to determine if I want to attempt for that time off of start of the year meetings, XC practice, and teaching. IF I made that decision, I would have to then see of it is something my Head Principal and administration team would support. Who knows?

2. Teammates: Rob and Tim have their own work situations that may or may not allow time off of work to try to go again. They are both back at work today knowing that we would already be through KC if we started today as originally scheduled. They both missed yesterday. 

3. We would be in need of aground crew we can trust. 

I would not rule it out just yet, but I mark it as unlikely. 

After hearing of the postponement, a Rob traveled back down from KC. Tim and I got a two hour pedal in at Fellows Lake to find the Third Wheel running smooth. We had an easy go of it averaging near 5mph while figuring out the boat and how we can manage our selfs. We got a few sprints in to se whet we could do. One GPS read our max speed at 10.3. My watch had us topping out at 9.8. This is flat water I remind you. This rig flies.

Anyway, back to processing the turn of events. Today marks 4 months since I made the first cuts.