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March 25, 2008 -- Hershey, PA
The first event of the Mid Atlantic Downriver Series (MADS) for 2008 kicked off on Sunday March 16th. The site was Tohickon
Creek in North East Pennsylvania, the site of the 2001 Wildwater Team trials, and a notoriously difficult run to learn without
incurring boat damage. A whole new generation of wildwater paddlers quickly picked up on the fact that the lines through the
ledges on the Tohickon are often only slightly wider than a wildwater boat, and that being off line could cost you valuable time.
Thanks go to Mike Warren for organizing an informal and friendly affair, despite driving back and forth from Harrisburg on
both Saturday and Sunday. The Reese’s peanut butter bunnies wee particularly awesome as prizes on a drab and drizzle-fest of a day.
Colby Zebel in his new Zastera Corvette, complete with annoying “Aggressor Fast, Clipper Easy” stickers, took the overall honors,
improving his time from the Fall race in 2007 by 26 seconds (about 2%). Upcoming junior sensation Peter Lutter overcame a
winter of paddling plastic to beat his time from the Fall by 31 seconds, but was still 8 seconds behind Colby. In the fat
old geezers class Chris Norbury came in 8% back, just ahead of Mike Warren, who overcame a hangover and a weekend of driving
to style his way down one of the ledges upside down and backwards and just miss out on Chris’ time by 3 seconds. Newcomer
Charley Bartlett posted a great time just back from those two in a wavehopper, although his willingness to throw his boat
through any line, regardless of whether it had any water in it or not, probably helped substantially. We’re hoping to see
Charley out in a glass boat, preferably something very fragile, at future MADS races.
Thanks to Hollie Noble who showed up, ran the river once and then wimped out and so was available for shuttle, timing etc.
If I didn’t know that Hollie was back paddling by the time I wrote this the criticism might be a bit more pointed, but it was
good to have her out there. Hopefully more folks from the region will see that racing regularly is the way to go. The only
way you can practice for racing is to race, so get out and support this series. We’re all having fun, and we’d love to have
you out there!
Results
| Name | Club | Class | Time | MADS points |
| Colby Zebel | CWC | K1M | 21.42 | 100 |
| Peter Lutter | LFWC | K1M JR | 21.50 | 99.39 |
| Chris Norbury | CWC | K1M Masters | 23.26 | 92.01 |
| Mike Warren | CWC | K1M | 23.29 | 91.78 |
| Charley Bartlett | LFWC | K1M | 23.38 | 91.09 |
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