Kayak vs. Thames Rowing Skiff - a personal experience

When I was a kayak guide we had all kinds of people with various levels of fitness and flexibility. Any of the medium performance production kayaks should be no problem for you to get in an out of once you are shown the proper way to sit on the back deck and slide in.

After seeing thousands of people try kayaking for the first time my all time favorite boat is the Wilderness Systems Tsunami line. Stable, comfy, and still performs amazingly well. It is boat that is comfortable for a beginner but gives up very little performance for the experienced paddler. A couple years after they came out we changed our entire fleet over to them in various sizes because they worked so well for so many different types of paddlers.

For a bit more money check out the Eddyline boats, very nice paddling and quite a bit lighter than a roto-molded boat while still retaining the durability of plastic.

A good paddle will also make a very big difference. When I was guiding we all had beat up, cheap, crappy boats, but would spend the money for carbon-fiber Werner paddles. Even before we started selling them and could get pro-deal we would pay full retail for Werner to get the best. The paddle will do more to increase enjoyment and performance than the boat. Paddles used to almost sell themselves since as soon as you let a person try a good one they would never want to go back to the cheaper ones.

 

Also, probably the best tall/heavy guy boat ever made is the Dirigo Boatworks 17. Pretty much impossible to find these days but if you ever see one buy it as fast as you can. I grew up sitting in my Dad's lap in one while we paddled and camped the Maine coast during vacations.

Eddyline made a similar model for a while as well, I can't remember the name but it was 17 feet long.

 

To keep this topic on track, I would like to repeat that performance is important. The benchmark performance is my Selway-Fisher Mandarin 17.
17' long, 45" wide, 130 pounds.
Here is today's GPS data summary:

Basically, I want to keep going at over 4.0 mph for 2 or 3 hours at a time.
The Demo Days kayaks I test drove I had trouble even getting 4.0 mph. And to maintain 3.5 mph I had to bust a gut. No Sale!

In these replies, I have seen subjective performance terms like:
"better performance"
"performs amazingly well"
"Any decent kayak should be able to cruise at 4+ mph"
I say, show me the GPS data!
One man's 3.0 mph is another man's 5.0 mph when you ask how fast can they row or paddle over a 5 mile course.

Blackburn Challenge data, while interesting, is beyond the scope of my interest, which is recreational, not competition.
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I found the Wilderness Tsunami 175 on the internet. The 20" cockpit width could be a problem for me. I'm thinking shoe horn for entering and Jaws of Life for exiting.
The design looks like a good performance recreational/touring kayak.
I believe I saw one Wilderness Tsunami at the Demo Days, but it was small. Maybe 14 feet long. With me in it, it would have approached submarine status.

If they had a 175, I would have definitely given it a test drive (assuming the Jaws of Life were available).

 

I don't have hard data, but I have spent something over 600 days in a kayak watching all types of people get in and learn, so have a pretty decent idea of what the various boats will do. Any decent boat in the 15-17 foot range will do 4 knots for several hours with a reasonably fit recreational paddler. We could keep a group of complete beginners moving at 2 knots average (including long rest stops) for a few hours without much trouble.

The Blackburn is a good data point because many of the "competitors" are actually just recreational paddlers out to have some fun.

I think some of your problem may just be inexperience in kayaks, it takes a while to get an efficient stroke and keep the boat moving along nicely. Really any kayak over 14 feet should have little trouble doing 3-4 knots for an hour or two.

Note that I am talking knots instead of mph since it is how I think about kayaks, so all my numbers are a bit lower than they would be in mph.

 

The Tsunami 175 was our "big guy" boat where I used to work. I think you might be surprised how well it fits. Before the Tsunami came out our "big guy" boat was the Wilderness System Sealution XL. No longer made but should be available on the used market. A bit less stable than the tsunami but a nice paddling boat with lots of volume for big feet. Remember that a kayak should be a snug fit in the hips, you want to wear it more than sit in it. Most experienced paddlers add foam to the hips to improve fit and prevent sliding around in the seat. You are looking for a performance boat and part of good kayak performance is a smaller, snug fitting cockpit. It will take some getting used to but is worth it.

At your size and weight you will be looking at something 16-17 feet. Even if you fit in a shorter boat it will float too low and paddle lousy.

Also make sure the foot pedals are properly set on any boat you try, it makes a huge difference in how much power you can put into the paddle. Your knees should push firmly against the knee braces whenever you flex your legs.

 

I paddled two kayak designs at Demo Days. 15.5 ft and 16 feet. Those were the longest kayaks they had at the show. I agree 100% that anything shorter will float too low. The end result was both kayaks paddled like barges. It felt like the knuckle of the bow was continuously 3" under water. That is bad for performance.

With respect to rowing, I have done a lot of weight adjusting, moving my rowing seat and oarlocks, and find this is best balance for my style of rowing.

Notice that 400 pounds of momentum keeps me coasting through the glide stroke.

The kayaks I demoed had almost no glide due to setting up a bow wave like a barge. I lost so much speed in the 1 second it takes to alternate paddle sides, that I could never accelerate over 4.0 mph.

Another good indication that my weight overloaded the kayak was that water was coming in the forward drain holes. There was always 1/4" of water over the floor of the self draining cockpit.

Water Line Length rules when you are hauling heavy loads.
(And I'm a heavy load.)

 

rowing and kayaking are completely different kinds of activities, they use very different muscle groups, require different skills, etc.

rowing is a very efficient means of converting muscle power into forward motion on a boat (backwards motion?). You ride in a lager boat specifically designed for your postion and rowing. Kayaking an efficient kayak means it will be much smaller, I think anything over 22" inches is too wide for a kayak. You must "wear" the kayak, it is meant to be snug, if not it will not perform well, like of like a ski boot, it moves with your body. Those large factory kayaks are more like decked canoes, too large and heavy to use your body to maneuver them. They of course would be slow, they feel to me like pushing a shoe box through the water.

in a row boat you sit high, with long oars, in a kayak you should be sitting right down on the keel, with your elbows just above the water surface. with a low narrow kayak, and a proper high aspect ratio paddle ("native" type), you can make real efficent strokes all day long as 4 to 5 mph. some even go faster. This postion will also put much less stress on your shoulder and joints than sitting high in a wide heavy "white man" production kayak.

It will take some getting used to, so if you want to be efficient in a kayak, it may not be to your liking if you are used to an efficient row boat. It is a very different kind of boating experience. My faborite kayak would be about 16 ft long and 20" wide, very low freeboard, low volumn. I am about 180 lbs and 5' 8" tall, you might want a kayak about 17 ft long, no larger than 22 in. They do not usually demo such kayaks since they are usually custom built or only for the very experianced.

It would be like riding only a kids tricycle and than saying to you do not care for the feel of all bicycles at all.

 

I am learning though experience that rowing and kayaking are, just like you said, completely different kinds of activities.

I generalized my approach to kayak selection and came up with wrong answers.
I figured fixed seat rowing involves back muscles and arm and shoulder muscles. So why not the same thing for kayaking? Obviously the load on the joints and muscles is quite different in the two applications.

I am beginning to think that rowing is the more efficient way to transfer "manpower" to the water to move the vessel through the water. I might be analyzing this wrong, but is there any way a 400 pound (total weight) kayak plus paddler plus equipment could keep up with a 400 pound equivalent rowing skiff?

What makes the kayak so attractive is it's light weight and relatively small volume. Of course, that works against us bigger guys, so I am finding out.

I may have to resign myself to the non-kayak solution which is the carbon fiber Heritage 18 (85 pounds) rowing skiff. I posted the details previously in this thread.
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you can use, and even enjoy using, a kayak in windy conditions, waves and swift currents. they are actually originated in some of the harshest climates in the world, and are best suited for that kind of wilderness travel. they can also get into small inlets and places where other boats usually can not go.

In conditions that would leave most rowers on shore, a kayaker might actually enjoy going out into, just for fun.

try this in a row boat:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxSDdaHzTJM

 

I think I'd go with Petros on this one. You probably need a 17' + length, my personal favourite when younger was the Eskimo type, but it is not a novice machine although not K1 tippy either. The easy length translates to easily driven and narrow beam to little resistance especially to waves. Also easier to get the paddle near the C/L for drive.

Your Thames skiff is a relative thoroughbred compared to say a 19' gig or ASC (bathtub) type, even if they are for more than one rower. It is not so far from a true rowing scull, but better on more open water in a range of wind/wave conditions. You need a canoe that is similar in its envelope to get a realistic comparison. Oddly being low but with a locally high foredeck compensating for the low freeboard as per the Greenland designs, gives a reasonable ride, not super wet at all, even in quite rough conditions. A spraydeck will be needed but should not be a problem.

Do not forget all the leverage you obtain from pure oar span, quite an advantage over a single stroke each side.

 

some more videos showing conventional sea kayaks having fun in heavy surf:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4KQ0RGh0GE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQiD3JlvBP8

 

It's a hell of a long way from a true rowing scull. Frankly the comparison is just laughable. The Mandarin 17 is about ten feet shorter on the waterline, and at least two feet wider on the waterline. It is not a high performance boat. Basically it's a picnic boat, designed to carry a good load at low to moderate speeds. There are any number of rowing boats which would be faster, if faster is what you want.

 

You beat me to posting the reply. The true rowing scull (shell) is good for one thing - competitive racing (and training that goes with it).

Fixed outriggers for the oars require special launching docks. The racing shell is probably more than 2 mph faster than a Mandarin 17.

In the rowing scull, where do you put your (female) passenger? The wine? The picnic basket?

It is a fact that this version of the Thames Rowing Skiff is a picnic rowing skiff.
And here is a photo to prove it, taken at the 2013 Madisonville Wooden Boat Festival where it won first in class at 0.0 mph.

 

There's a lot to be said for simply messing about in boats.