Hi all,

I've been very busy lately, and as a consequence this blog have seen very few updates. My current mission is to produce an instructional DVD aimed at the French market. No English version, sorry ! the likes of Jackson, Addison, Westgarth... have produced good DVDs, and there was no need - and no room - for one more. So it's French only this time. You can still have a look at the trailer if you wish - some good action to be seen, including the phenomenal aerial move performed by Benjamin Durand last spring in Lyon.

Have a look here :
http://www.methode-kayak.com/index.php/Videos/

I also plan to release the first ever High Definition paddling clip on the web (to my knowledge at least) in the coming days. Stay tuned ! you're gonna love it ;-)

It's gonna be a 150/160 Mo download, so make sure you get a fast connection in the meantime...

Anyway, I digress, the idea of this update was to let you know about the interview I gave to the world's best paddling publication - aka Kayak Session, which is featured in the latest issue. "Monsieur Suave", as they call me. Indeed ;-)


www.kayaksession.com

From this point I've decided people shall refer to me as "Monsieur S" exclusively.

Sincerely yours,
Monsieur S.

Hi all,

Following my last post about the Powerade Outdoor Games, here's a direct link to the high resolution version of my team's movie "Bachelorette":

http://teamfrogs.free.fr/videos/POG06_Bachelorette_AVC_1Mbps.mp4

As usual, right click / save as... the file is 44Mo and requires Quicktime 7. The picture and sound quality is excellent, check it out!

Right now I'm in the Embrun area, in the French Alps, enjoying the few runs that are still runnable and the warm and sunny climate. What a perfect place to be in summer! I'm seriously considering establishing myself in the area one day.

David Arnaud

Hi all,

Back from Interlaken (Switzerland), tired and happy. The film competition was astounding. The quality of the movies was clearly better than last year. All 5 teams really put their best into filming and editing, and this resulted in 5 very different movies.

www.outdoorgames.ch

[Read more...]

After winning the first edition of the Powerade Outdoor Games last year, I was invited to compete again with the "Ride the Planets" team in this unique film competition. The concept remains the same: the 5 teams have one week to produce a 5-min movie to be screened and judged on saturday evening. Each team has one or two riders in each of these disciplines: kayaking, climbing, paragliding, moutain biking and BASE jumping.

The "Ride the Planets" team in 2005:

More pics from last year: http://www.thinkliquid.net/news/index.php?itemid=132


Such a line-up of world-class athletes is really impressive and maybe unique on an event. As far as kayaking is concerned, the paddlers are Steve Fisher, Arnd Schaeftlein, Matt Cooke, Raph Tiebaut, Simon Strohmeier and myself. Not bad!
The teams have only a few hours left to deliver their movie to the organization. This is the final rush after a week-long marathon of scouting, shooting and editing, with very little sleep inbetween. Everybody's super tired but impatient at the same time to see the other teams' movies tomorrow night on the giant screen in downtown Interlaken. I think most movies will focus on humor this year, as we did last year with our winning film "Gravity Super Heroes".

There will also be several competitions this saturday, including a boater-cross on the Weisse Lutschine. Tired as we all are, we might well have our asses kicked by the paddlers who came for the race only ;-)

For pics, news and to check last year's movies, check the Outdoor Games website:
www.outdoorgames.ch

And stay tuned as the 2006 movies should be online very soon!

Check out this move by Benjamin Durand in his Riot Flair, last spring in Lyon. I've seen a lot of footage and pics from waves all over the world, but I cannot remember seeing anything as big as this:



And he sticked the move! This is a still from the video footage captured that day. I'm currently editing a clip of our spring season in Lyon, where we were gifted with awesome waterlevels for nearly 3 months in a row. The wave worked at many different levels, offering a wide variety of height, speed, and sensations. Lyon was the place to be!
Everything was shot using my new HDV camera. I'll try to release the clip using one of the available HD codec (windows media or quicktime) for your viewing pleasure! stay tuned!

As the festival is getting closer, more and more paddlers are arriving in Lyon to discover and train on the infamous Hawaii sur Rhone wave.


The village is also being built - and it's gonna be huge, judging by the 4 giant trucks that arrived this morning!


Spectators will enjoy a nice tribune just next to the big ramp where the Big Air will take place. The show's gonna be good!


This year's contest will definately be a tough one, as the eddy here looks like the "who's who" of freestyle kayaking : the Jackson family, Tyler Curtis, Pat Camblin, Anthony Yap (among many others) are already here, and more pretendents should arrive today and tomorrow from Germany, the US, Canada... There are already about 12-15 countries represented here, that's pretty cool!

The waterlevel is not as high as expected after the big and long floods of last spring. Still, the foampile is pretty consistent, so early flushes shouldn't be a problem compared to previous years. However it's still pretty hard to set up moves and bounce high. While local paddlers (me included) bitch about how bad the wave is at this level, first-timers are generally impressed by the quality of the feature. I can't help but think of their reaction if they actually saw the wave at a great level... like this for example:

The Tourism Board of the Hautes-Alpes has set up 2 webcams over some of the most frequented spots of the Durance valley, the infamous Rabioux wave and the slalom course at l'Argentiere.

The quality is simply incredible, closer to live video than the traditional webcams where you get a still every minute or so. Check it out with the following link, there are 2 webcams for the moment on the map, simply click on the "W" and choose your connection speed below the picture.

http://www.eaux-vives.fr/index.php?id=853

More webcams should appear in the future. Pretty cool toy!

Hey all,

It's been a while since I last updated this section of the website. I've spent the last 6 months working on the editing and distribution of "In-Flux", my latest movie which has already won several international prizes and awards. Check it out by clicking here!

Now I've dropped the keyboard and mouse a bit, and I've spent a lot of time on the water recently. The Hawaii-sur-Rhone wave has been going off at near-perfect levels for a couple months. Conditions were ideal to test my new sponsor's paddle, the Select W1!


Select is a French manufacturer which has been a leader in composite construction and windsurf fins for more than 20 years. They started working on paddles about 3 years ago, and are now releasing a very interesting lineup of paddles, from flatwater sprint to seakayaking, slalom and whitewater.



Their whitewater model of choice is the W1. You can chose from several constructions, carbon or fiberglass, straight or bentshaft, as well as a medium or large size for the blade. I have two Select paddles at the moment:

- for freestyle, I'm using a W1 ergo, 188cm long, with large blades and a 30� angle.
- for creeking, I'm using a W1 ergo, 192cm with medium blades and a 30� angle.



The W1 blade offers a very comfortable feel, very natural and easy. The ergo shaft is simply great - even with the large blades which are physically very demanding, my wrists and elbow have never been better.

Select also brings a very interesting innovation in the form of an adjustable shaft. This system is called "Vario S Lock". In just a few seconds, you can change the size and angle of your W1 to go full force with a longer paddle, or make it a bit shorter for tiny shallow creeks. For those who cannot afford several paddles (one for creeking and one for playboating, for example) this is also the perfect way to quickly adjust the size of your W1 and make it an all-around paddle, always adapted to the boat you're in.


Construction is top notch. With more than 20 years of experience in high-end composite construction and 3 years in the thinking, these paddles are super strong and durable. There are up to 14 layers at the most exposed zones of the blade, as well as additional reinforcements layers on the blades' axis. Still, the W1 is pretty light -varying between 960 and 1100 gr according to height, construction type and blade size.


Just by looking at the W1, you can feel that this is no ordinary paddle. I think Select products easily compare to the top paddles brand out there. Other designs and improvements are in the work, including a new slalom paddle developped with World Champion and Olympic medalist Fabien Lefevre.

Select is currently developping its distributors network around the world, even if the lack of carbon fiber at the international level makes it difficult to answer the demand. Check their website or drop them an email if you want to put your hands on one of these quality paddles!

Hey all,

I've had a few questions lately about the availability of Wild Water Adrenaline in the US and Canada. In case you missed it, WWA is a rafting and paddling video game for Playstation 2 on which I worked as a consultant.



So I asked the editor of WWA, and they're currently securing a deal with a distributor for North America. The making of the NTSC version of WWA is also gonna take a few weeks, so all in all the game should be available during the first trimester of 2006.

The good news is, In-Flux is being duplicated and you'll soon be able to order the DVD for the long winter evenings ;-)

Mr Postman had some cool stuff for me today.

First were a few copies of "Wild Water Adrenaline", the game I've been working on as a consultant (browse the archives or do a search to learn more about it). The first meeting I had about this project was exactly a year ago, and after being delayed a few times it's now available in store, cool!

Then this UPS guy showed up to deliver a few copies of Salomon's "Adrenaline Hunters: The Movie". This is not the usual Adrenaline Hunters DVD, but a movie made especially for Salomon's Roadshow. The film features many Salomon athletes in skiing, roller skating, snowboarding, climbing, moutain biking, base-jumping, kayaking... Basically it's a truck equipped with a giant screen which toured Europe last spring and summer, showing this movie on major sport events and venues. I think this is the same truck/screen that was at the 2004 Lyon River Festival, for those who remember.



However, if you missed the Roadshow there's little chance you'll ever see this version of the movie, because this DVD is a limited edition for internal use and for the people who got involved in a way or another...