New Boat and the Joys of Outfitting

Waking up Sunday, for the first morning in the cabin was no disappointment, the view is spectacular.

The first task of the day was to sort out our roof rack,  while the rental car had roof rails, there wasn't a gap underneath, so we would need to us foam blocks to set the wood pieces on before using a strap through the car doors to cinch the whole thing on the roof.  There's no easy or good way to this, just a little creativity, trial and error.

Here's an interesting sight: Dr. Team Manager Chris Norbury using a hand tool

Once the roof rack was sorted the next task was to get internet to find my boat.  My boat was bought from a German company, luckily the father of an Australian team member was driving near the factory and was able to bring it from Germany to the course in Italy. That's one of the cool reasons I like wildwater,  all of the small teams work together to help each other out.  After wandering around in Sondrio looking for a place with wifi, we stumbled upon a phone company store.  Turns out for 50 euro we could buy a mobile wifi hotspot with 7GB of data for the time we were in Italy this was a much better deal than renting one and bringing it from the US.  And since we bought it, in the future all we would need is another SIM card. Happy with the purchase, we found a cafe to eat that also had wifi.  We were able to sort out that my boat would be at the sprint course later that afternoon.  Since we had some time to kill we looked at different parts of the course

Once of the spots to see part of the course is at an old stone bridge that was built by the Romans

Looking downstream from the bridge,  the whitewater is much bigger than it looks

After a while we headed to the sprint course to meet up and grab my boat. The Aussies and Irish were going to paddle so I watched since I would have a lot of outfitting to do, and I wasn't in a hurry to just jump on hard whitewater in the brand new boat.

$2400 boat on $20 roof rack 

We headed up the valley back to the garden supply shop to grab some epoxy because I would need it to secure my foot bar. The boat comes with aluminum foot braces, but they are only little pedals that are right next to the side of the boat, since I knew what would come with it, I prepared by pre-making a foot board and bringing it with me.  Since I paddle this design in the US, all I had to do was measure where everything was and I should be able to make it fit just right.  After acquiring the epoxy, the next task was prepping everything by marking out where the foot board would go and shaving it to fit just right.  Since I am quite tall people tend to ask if I need to order special boats, I just smile and say no, but the procedure below is always in the back of my mind. 

Since I am tall, the boat needs to be dropped on top of me, then I lean forward and can barely reach where the foot board needs to go

Since the boat is a very confined space especially with half my body inside, a good respirator and headlamp are essential equipment

After a decent amount of time preparing everything it was time to start mixing the epoxy to get start, but when I opened the tube I found out that it was the wrong type of epoxy, it was thickened epoxy which has fillers to act like a glue rather than the liquid epoxy which is used to wet out composite cloths like the carbon fiber I would be using for my foot board. We quickly put the word out asking the Irish and the Australians if they had any epoxy.  Luckily they both did, but the Australians got back first and after getting their address I was off to pick it up.  I should note, it's a pretty good time driving in the Alps in the car with a manual gearbox.  After arriving back I quickly set everything back up and got to work laying up the carbon. Since the plan was to meet at 10 tomorrow morning, we brought the boat inside where it would be warmer to speed curing of the epoxy.  

This boat is expensive, not particularly well made, but man it looks good

Heading to the Course

Saturday morning Chris and I were in Milan packing up and getting ready to head north into the Alps.  But before we left I wanted to stroll around Milan one more time.  The plan was to go to Taglio, the really good cafe we ate at last night, but they weren't open, so I wandered around the canals and saw a pretty cool mural.

Jump the shark

After the nice walk we packed up and set about leaving Milan, which miraculously happened without making and wrong turns, running any red lights or hitting any cars, white knuckle driving but good.  Once on the highway it was smooth sailing. Since we had plenty of time we elected to drive the coast road along Lake Como rather than stay on the highway, it was a good decision.

Yep definitely worth it

The timing worked out that we had lunch on a lake side cafe  on Lake Como, just a nice place to drive around, and since it was early summer, it wasn't super busy.  There's a Moto Guzzi museum I wanted to stop at but they are only open for one hour a day,  italians...

Once we rejoined the higway it was a short trip to Sondrio, the biggest  city near the course.  The next task was trying to find the cabin where we would be staying.  To do this we needed a local map, which meant finding an information center.  On the third village we finally found one that was open and was able to get a map that led to where we were actually staying after many wrong turns.  In small italian villages, street signs or labels of any kind are small and hard to see.  Eventually we had it all sorted out and the next step was to find wood to make a roof rack for the rental car.  Luckily there was a home and garden store the next village up the valley and it was actually pretty easy to get to then we bought food and headed back.  After a little food, we received word that a member of the Irish team was around and was willing to show us around to the different parts of the race course, this was a good oportunity to see exactly where we needed to go to access the course which would save us a great amount of driving around figuring it out on our own. 

Training (my palate)

Well today was an off day in Milan.  I had ambitions to rent a motorycle and try to drive the Stelvio, but the combination of there being snow and just the experience of italian driver's I decided that could wait for another trip.  Instead we had a plan to drive to a wood working shop to buy some wood to make a roof race for the rental car.  After making directions and look at maps we set off.   Let me just say that driving in Milan is ambitious, just the vast number or cars combined with lane splitting scooters/motorcycles along with lots of cyclists and pedestrians makes things difficult.  About a quarter of the way there I ended up taking a wrong turn,  then took and even worse one heading further into the city center.  It took driving in a bus lane and some aggressive driving to make it back in the right direction. Once we got to the spot where I thought the store was the next task was finding a parking spot.  After a few go rounds of the streets in the area we actually managed to find one and with a little direction I was able to parallel park the car, which I believe is honestly the first time I've had to do it since my drivers license test. Then, we had to find the actual store, the unfortunate part was that we actually weren't at the right spot and after spending half an hour wandering around we gave up and headed back. After driving in Milan traffic for a good portion of the morning I came back and took a nap.  Later in the afternoon we headed out again but this time on foot.  We already saw the Duomo yesterday so today we went to an old castle, not really sure of the name but it was cool.

The main entrance of the castle

Outside of the entrance there were some crazy street performers.  The top one is sitting on a soccer ball on top of a pole held in one hand by the man on the bottom who is sitting on a glass jar.  The were just sitting there static, who knows for how long.

from inside the castle

Some castle's have moats with water, this one has a moat of stray cats

The view out the back of the castle

After all this wandering we were getting hungary. I heard tip from one of my old roomates about a cool coffee shop in Milan, after looking them up, it turned out they had an eight course dinner special that night, so that sounded like a good thing to try.  First was some Jean-paul Deville champagne 

Next, was basically a vegetable medley, but with 15 different elements and it was amazing

Next was a sort of tomato paste with stewed yellow tomatoes, basil and several other things I can't remember

this course was branzino (sea bass) with sea urchins, and a spinach cream sauce

Then came the some sort of meat? haha well it was marinated for 3 hours, then roasted and dried slightly and served with a light mustard sauce on thin slices of toasted bread doused in olive oil

Then came a shot of yogurt with ginger to cleanse the palate

Ah dessert, dark chocolate mouse, with rasberry jam, and white chocolate cream,  not nearly enough of this, so they have us another plate

Top it off with some really good espresso and some cookies. An excellent meal in a really cool cafe.  Going to try and head back in the morning for this before leaving Milan, so good.

Long Flight and First Impressions

Well my self and Chris Norbury (Team Manager) have arrived in Milan and we made it to our hotel or at least that's the short boring version.  Going back a few steps, we both were on the same flight and ironically the same row of the plane which made the logistics of meeting in the airport easier.  Once we picked up our luggage, the plan was to rent a car and make our way into Milan (the larger airport is a little ways from the interesting part of Milan).  Since Chris would be heading back sooner than I, was he was going to put the rental car in his name and I would share cost.  Yet Chris didn't know his driver's license was expired until he tried to rent a car at the airport, so now the rental car was in my name, but attached to Chris's credit card, haha perfect...  Jeremy Clarkson from Top Gear said that the fastest car in the world is a rental car, because it's a car you will drive to the limit.  I disagree, I say the fastest car in the world is a rental car on someone else's credit card haha.    So we hopped in and started on our way towards finding our hotel.   Let's just say that being jetlagged and jumping straight into absurd crazy italian traffic is not the most relaxing, luckily I can drive quickly,  we made it through the madness to the hotel.  Since it was still early, we couldn't check in, but we were able to park the car and explore a little on foot,  there was a nice restaurant a little down the street so we went there for lunch, after two airline meals, the food was delicious and the shot of espresso that came the meal was much needed to keep the jetlag at bay.
After the meal we still had some time to kill so we walked to the city centre.  I've never been in any of the really old cities so it was cool to see everything made of stone instead of asphalt. We wandered around the plaza of the Duomo and even went inside for a bit (I didn't have my camera on me so google duomo, the third largest church in the world).  It wasn't long until the inevitable happened, someone asked me if I played basketball..... After a while we went back to check into the hotel and shower, and sleep a little.
I booked the hotel through hotwire for two adults,  I was sort of hoping that it would mean two beds, but it didn't.  The receptionist even tried to be coy be say there was only a single available, which I responded with a deadpan stare and stammering uhhhhh, luckily she was joking but there is only a queen size bed. Ah memories.

Italy Bound

Hi there, well later today I will take a flight to Italy to begin training for the World Championships.  I've always like the idea of trying to keep this updated but recently there have been several distractions: graduation, picking grad schools, find places to live,  and even working in NC for the past two weeks. Since this is my second World Championships race I have a better idea of what to expect and how things will play out.  I'll keep this updated as training progresses and especially for the races.  Thanks to everyone who helped by donating or buying a shirt!

Kurt

Fundraising!

In 10 weeks I will be representing the United States at the Wildwater World Championships in Italy. Since wildwater isn't an olypmic sport there is no funding, so to try and raise money for this trip I'm selling t-shirts. $20 for cotton, $30 for synthetic. All proceeds go towards my expenses. Plus I have a pretty cool boat designed... So if your interested, message me or email krsmithgall@gmail.com. I'll be submitting the order on April 15th so if you are interested, make sure to get in contact with me before then, but donations are welcome anytime. Thanks, Kurt

T-shirt design

Polo Shirt Design

Boat Design

Fundraiser Letter

Hello my name is Kurt Smithgall and I am a member of the United States Wildwater Team.  In June, I will represent the United States at the Wildwater World Championships in Italy. I am contacting you in hopes of raising money for this trip.  In case you are unaware, Wildwater kayaking is a non-Olympic discipline where competitors race kayaks down different lengths of whitewater.  It is a sport that tests both the competitor’s skill as well as strength. While it is not an Olympic sport, it is quite competitive. When I first raced on the team in the summer of 2012 there were over 70 competitors from 35 different countries at the World Championships in France.  This coming summer I hope to improve my rank and better represent the United States in international competition.  Since France, I have continued to train hard and get faster.  For 2013, I was ranked 2^nd in the national rankings for wildwater. Before I go over the specifics of what I am asking I want to tell you about my personal background.

  I first started whitewater kayaking when I was 12 and it quickly became a passion of mine.  Once I became comfortable on whitewater, I started racing and by my senior year of high school I had become hooked on the new challenge of racing.  I made a commitment to training and racing through college despite the rigors of engineering classes. It was a lot of hard work, and this May I will graduate from Penn State with a degree in Biological Engineering and with a 3.5 GPA no less. I apply myself in all aspects of my life and I have worked very hard to get to where I am now.

As I mentioned earlier Wildwater is a not an Olympic sport.  What this means is there is virtually no funding for the national team.  All major expenses from airfare and transportation to hotels and lodging are up to each individual competitor.  I work as both a teaching assistant and research assistant while being a full time student in addition to training ten times per week. There just simply aren’t enough hours in the day to work enough to afford this trip on my own.  I am asking if you would be willing to donate some money to help fund my trip. Every penny that you give will go toward my direct expenses.  Several of us on the team are starting to plan the logistics and I will need to book an airline ticket as well as start to save for my expenses while competing in Italy this summer.

My projected costs are between $6000 and $7000 and if you chose to donate I will be extremely grateful and you directly help me represent the United States in international competition.   As an added incentive if you donate $20 I will send you a cotton tshirt, a $30 donation will result in a synthetic tshirt, and a $45 donation will result in a US Team polo shirt.  If you would like to support me you can mail a check to the address below with your shirt size or send it by paypal to krsmithgall@gmail.com.  If you have any questions feel free to call or send me an email.  Thank you for taking the time to read this and I hope to have your support.



Kurt Smithgall
225 Montour Street
Montoursville, PA 17754
krsmithgall@gmail.com