The Secure Scuttlebutt

05/26/2026, 04:55:18 PM

Race Report: 2026 General Clinton Canoe Regatta 70-Miler

I completed the longest paddle I've ever attempted on Sunday, canoeing 70 miles from Cooperstown, NY to Bainbridge, NY in a race down the Susquehanna River.

image:two very tired paddlers (I'm in the front) crossing a finish line represented by a banner that has gotten tangled up in its line over the river

This was quite possibly the hardest physical thing I've ever done.

We fell in probably 4-5 times. Don't ask me to count exactly. I was thinking "1, 2, 3, ... 7, SWITCH" for twelve hours straight. Also one time I looked back and my sternman was outside of the boat, so does that count for half? The ideal number of times to fall in is zero, but one of the pros confided to us that he fell in once.

It rained steadily for the first half. The main outcome was that my hands blistered pretty badly, which sucked for the second half of the race. Our support crew got us gloves that helped a lot. Why didn't I bring them from the start??

One of our biggest takeaways is that we were not prepared for the rapids. There were easily class II+ rapids that roughed us up every time.

I lost two water bottles. They were the only things of mine that weren't strapped down. My support replaced at about the halfway point, so I only had to paddle a short section without hydration.

image:A better shot of us paddling. If I have an expression on my face, it's because I was feeling things

One of my coworkers didn't now what type II fun is, so here's a refresher:

image:"the fun scale": type II fun is only fun in retrospect

There was a live stream of the entire event from a variety of vantage points. I'll watch through more thoroughly over time. The one place I spotted us was when I stumbled in front of the camera, and we took a minute to try to figure out what we were doing at a dicey put-in after a dam and carry. The person on camera summed us up quickly and accurately, calling out that they saw us fall in early, that we were taking our time, and that we looked unsteady on the water. Yep, that was us.

image:Look ma, I'm on YouTube.

I would say we had a competent start but fell back further and further as we grew more sore, tired, and less confident throughout the day. Twelve hours was my guess for how long it would take us, but I was hoping for less. The race was about seven miles shorter than I expected (my watch measured 63.4mi). I can't express how relieved I was when I saw that finish line. I'm sure we could have done the extra mileage, but it would have been even more painful.

This was a great experience. I currently have zero interest in doing it again, but ask me in a year.

05/09/2026, 09:23:30 PM

Race Report: 2026 'Round the Mountain

This is a lovely 10 mile paddling race around lakes that circle Dewey Mountain in Saranac Lake. I walked about two miles from where I was staying near the finish, to the start, to do the race and also to close the big loop.

The weather was perfect. A bit chilly but perfect for staying active. It was sunny much of the time with only one windy bit where we had to fight a little to keep from going sideways.

We did this race in the racing canoe as our last big workout before the General Clinton 70-miler.

My primary goal was to not fall in. Up to this point, we've fallen in about once per trip on average. The boat is a lot tipper than the one I'm used to using. Goal achieved: we didn't fall in. The start was incredibly dicey, but I convinced the other paddler to stay out of the way of the chaos and just hold back until things smoothed out and there was room to pass. This worked well.

My secondary goal was to go a little bit fast. I knew some people in the race that it would have been nice to beat, but mainly I wanted to beat my solo time from the previous year, and if it were possible to beat the the pair my crew-mate was in the previous year, that would be ideal, too. This was a great success. We went about ten minutes faster than I did solo and faster than all the times/people I had my eye on. So I'm happy about all of that. I'm not usually determined to go fast, but in this case I've been frustrated that having two people in a racing boat hasn't been overwhelmingly speedy up to this point.

Finally, this was the first time we've been out canoeing that I didn't feel like my arms were going to immediately fall off. I think it's a combination of getting in slightly better shape and improving my form somewhat.

image:'Round the Mountain 2026 wave 1 start - a bunch of canoes and kayaks in a lake, just off the beach, ready to go

The place we're staying is one of our favorites. I particularly enjoy watching all the vehicles with canoes arrive in the morning at leave throughout the day with the lake in the background. I feel like I could thoroughly enjoy living in this sort of place.

image:Saranac Lake cure porch overlooking Lake Flower. I might be on a laptop writing this post

05/07/2026, 12:27:01 AM

Inspired by https://daniel.haxx.se/blog/2026/03/15/one-hundred-curl-graphs/, I want to do something with Tilde Friends and graphs. I haven't gotten very far, but I wrote a script to gnuplot this graph from git.

I assume the big jumps are mostly dependencies, though some of the trends are consequences of my own actions.

I haven't decided what I'm going to do with this. Maybe I'll just make a dashboard web page that is updated periodically. Maybe I'll make an account like @SecureScuttlebuttDevelopmentActivity that posts these occasionally. I sort of like that, because I like these sorts of things shoved in my face.

📈️

image:Tilde Friends lines of code vs. time

05/06/2026, 11:37:28 PM

This is a test post. (it worked)

05/03/2026, 11:40:00 PM

I drilled 96 holes this weekend. More pegs and shelves pending.

image:jumbo pegboard wall above a headboard