Michael Daly wrote:

. break more easily due to deformed shaft

??? Never heard of this before.

I saw some posts on Boatertalk.com alluding to it. When AT paddles
first arrived on the market with bent shafts (were they the first?)
many stories appeared about them breaking easily. Wilko posted that
he broke a bent-shaft paddle. My local kayak shop, where they push
the Lendal paddle-lock system, said that even ovalized shafts (e.g.
Werner or Lightning) cause weakness. So I put 2 + 2 together.

Laminated wood bent shaft, my gawd. Thanks for your help!