If your hands are closer together than you essentially have a "longer" paddle to roll with, which should make your roll even easier. This will also help to create a more powerful and clean forward stroke and sweep stroke.
If you are trying to roll with your hands at the bottoms of the blades (end of the shaft), you can only reach the length of your arms plus the blade...

Awesome Book. Hopefully you somehow have the original edition.

Nealy was a potent fixture of 1980's Whitewater Culture. That was his instructional book, which became what he was known for. Prior to it he had published several other books such as Whitewater Home Companion Vol's 1 & 2, Kayaks To Hell, and Whitewater Tales of Terror. I still got a few of them, including Kayak and Jimmy Snyder's Squirt Book.

He also did some books on mountain biking shortly after mountain biking gained popularity.

Every whitewater shop up and down the Appalachians carried his river maps of such rivers as the Yough, Cheat, Gauley, Occoee, etc. The original classics back there. And everyone was walking around wearing his T-shirts.

Before Gopro or any practical video technology. Before Social Media, Google Maps or Internet. That was an era when Whitewater Kayaking truly was a fringe sport.

And William Nealy was an expression of that.

The Way I like to think about placement is how would you push on an object in front of you? Would you do it with your hand out in front of your face or over your head? Or if you were to punch something would you drive you hand forward in front of your face or over your head?

Once thing to also think about is the paddle stroke is not just a pulling motion, it's a push/pull motion. The idea that you have an "off" hand is silly and when you take a stroke you should consider how you are using both your arms and your torso. The narrow grip also extends your reach and length of stroke.

The problem many paddles have is that the bent shaft paddles have a very wide grip so people use that wider stance because that is what their paddle has dictated to them.

Really there is no wrong way to position you hands on the paddle it really comes down to what works for you as a paddler. I know serveral very accomplished paddlers that use a wide grip and don't seem to have issues, but I'm increasingly seeing more boaters use a narrower grip.

Play around with it and good luck.

Good points, Jed.
Yup. You really can simultaneously push and pull with both hands better with the narrow stance. Again, triggered by Torso Rotation. That can't be stressed enough. And as jed and megan pointed out the narrow stance lets you extend more of the shaft, and therefore the blade, a bit further past your toes when you sink that catch. But again, you are also exposed to more torque, so you need to know what your doing.




Haha-

I still have all 4 of the late W. Nealy's books and one of his posters. The first 3 were basically jumbo size underground comic books for paddlers, and then he published Kayak, a book with illustrations and explanations that were far more accessible to novice kayakers than any previous instruction book. I suggest you find someone of similar build who has a smooth and strong paddling style, then study the details (like hand position) of how they do it. Take every opportunity to practice good technique in the flat water between drops.

I just finished reading the book last night.

Another thing that jumps out at me as I read it is how frequently he recommends reverse sweeps, or reverse "slaps" for many types of illustrated scenarios.

Some people are really resistant to the idea of using any reverse sweep/rudder/brake stroke at all, and recommend a sweep on the right as opposed to a reverse stroke of any kind on the left. The book reinforces an idea that I like - that there is a place for every stroke and much of that has to do with your speed vs. the speed of the current, and what your desired speed is. If I am already going too slow to punch a hole and I need to change boat angle prior to it, I will probably sweep. If I am already in fast water and going faster than the water, I can probably do some type of braking reverse stroke. Although you hear many people demonize any braking strokes of any kind.

I'm not sure that saying you get more leverage and power from a narrow grip is exactly accurate. You can apply much more power by having your hand next to the blade, but it's a short burst of power. It can seem like it's less power because if you're pulling fast/hard enough you're causing the blade to cavitate.

With a narrow grip, you're dispersing power over a longer period of time. The water gives more resistance against your paddle blade which might be why it feels like you have more power.

I paddle with a fairly narrow grip because of this. I like (in general) having the paddle in the water longer. This gives me the advantage of being able to fine tune strokes rather than pulling out and taking another one. Of course when lining up a big slide all bets are off, then it's time to widen up for me.

Brian/Mauler,

I think folks are saying that wider grip = more power/torque IF your blade is getting deep into the water. But narrower grip gets blade deeper into the water and extends farther to the front of the boat for power strokes. Narrower grip is generally less torque, but blade gets into water deeper which creates better purchase. For me, using narrower grip was really doing a lot to correct my strokes and smooth things out, as my problem was paddle getting shallow on sweeps.

A followup on our chat about paddle length and grip:

I have tried a few things:

Narrower grip
Narrower boats
Longer paddle.

My paddle was 197cm. Switching to 203cm paddle with downturned blades and simultaneously using narrower boat made the paddle feel too long again. Werner suggests 200cm for my height and looks like they are right, but I think the 197cm will work ok for narrower and smaller boats. It is amazing what just 3 to 6cm on paddle length does.

Interestingly, EJ's River Running DVD says for river running you can go way way longer especially when starting out, and that he generally disagrees with paddle manufacturer guidelines on that. If you have a longer full volume boat with little rocker, you definitely can do more effective sweeps and forward strokes with a paddle a bit longer.

my experience so far has led me to believe there isn't really much difference in all these products/setups. Every boat, every paddle, every pfd, etc has felt different/odd at first, but after awhile ya figure out it's tricks, and it feels about the same. I think it's easy when you're beginning to chase the 'best' setup, when reality is, we just need to practice. Some boats are the right tool for the job, but some folks prove that to be ambiguous all the time. 

Update - regarding paddle grip and paddle length

To resummarize, I was kayaking a large Jackson Zen with a paddle that was a bit small for me based on Werner recommendations - a 197cm Powerhouse (I am 6 foot 2 inches tall). I later got a smaller kayak - a Dagger Nomad 8.5, and right away the paddle didn't feel too small for me - worked fine. Recently tried a demo paddle - a 203cm Werner Double Diamond. For my small boats, it felt a bit large.

Just a couple weeks ago I bought a 200cm Werner Powerhouse. IT FEELS JUST RIGHT when I am paddling the Zen, and doesn't feel too big on my smaller kayaks either.

I ran into a guy at the pool tonight who also just recently got a Jackson Zen - large size like mine. He ALSO had a paddle the same size as my old one - 197cm. He was having trouble with his roll being as consistent as it was on prior kayak. He was about 6 feet tall, but his Zen is same size as mine. He ended up borrowing a 200cm paddle and he was rolling right up.

Lessons learned: I think the large size Zen, being an older 2012 model Zen, has pretty flat rocker, and it is also a pretty wide kayak. I think that boat in particular really demands a longer paddle than you would typically use if you were paddling a Dagger Nomad 8.5 or similar type/length creek boat. 200cm is the recommended size for my height. I didn't think 3cm would make such a big difference but it really does. 3cm more and it starts feeling to long on the smaller kayaks.

I also now have moved the seat back one notch from the center - which Jackson says is a popular setup for the Zen (either center notch or one notch back). I tried it all the way forward once and hated it. I have done center notch and also one notch back and I feel like one notch back is the best all around setting so far.

As a beginning kayaker, my kayaking began to really improve when I switched to the smaller creek boat (Dagger Nomad). But now that I have a longer and better fitting paddle, I'm starting to enjoy the Zen much more than I used to, and am using it on the water more. It is a planning hull boat so it has more of a high performance setup going on. The Nomad sure gets you down stuff nice though and is a great confidence building boat, and it didn't seem to matter that my paddle was a little small when I was in it because the Nomad spins so much easier being shorter, narrower, and having so much more rocker.

As for grip, with the longer paddle, I went with straight shaft. Everything is just feeling more natural with this paddle so grip seems to be less of an issue.

Typically if I'm blaming things on equipment....it's NOT the equipment...it's the user.....

Edited by megspk - 16 Mar 2016 at 8:30pm