Well here's a Story.....
After watching my daughter Emma paddle on the Thames a couple of years ago, I saw how easy it looked and thought I would give it a go. To the amusement of all the other parents and coaches, I spent more time in the water than in the Kayak!
I did all the races that the club did that year and fell in at them all apart from one. An iconic race in the paddling world is the Devizes to Westminster, I started to hear talk of it, 125 miles with 77 portages. My mind started whurring, just one problem, I couldn't stay upright.
One day I mentioned this to Ellen Bull and she said her husband Matt would do it with me (double kayak), another problem, he'd never paddled either. We shook on it, and the next week we entered the Medway Marathon, we had no boat, they lent us one, we forgot our paddles and bouyancy aids and we told the people at Tonbridge Canoe Club we were training for DW.
It was a 17 mile canoe race, Matt and I were confident we would win looking at the line-up of competition but this unfortunately wasn't to be the case, we finished last in a shameful 4 hours 47 mins, even the slowest people finished 90 mins before us. We spent more time swimming than paddling.
I never knew Matt before but knew after that day that if we could finish that race, we could do anything. Roll on 6 months later, we have a boat, paddles and life jackets, we have taken advice from as many people as we can, (coaches and kids) and there are so many people that have helped us with words of wisdom along the way.
So we can stay upright now, we have done lots of long paddles and padding in river conditions that are nasty to say the least, we paddle in the dark with an element of confidence and we feel ready to take on this epic challenge.
Lots of people have asked us if we are raising money and we have decided that it's only right to give something back to the club that has given so much to us and more importantly, our children, Sam and Emma.
We also need a few of them to support us through the night which is a massive ask as we are hoping to do this in under 24 hours!
We are raising money for Bouyancy aids for the kids of Elmbridge canoe club. Please give what you can and come and cheer us on over the easter weekend if you're about.
Cheers, Phil & Matt (Bully & Sumner)