See ATs website
www.atpaddles.com

At 6'2", according to their sizing chart, you are betwix and between a
197 and 200 cm for the AT4 River.

Some possibilities:
1) grip is in the wrong place
2) grip is too hard
3) blade angle / grip angle not right / unaccustomed for you.

The grip area is not right where the shaft goes into the paddle... it
is up on the deflected bit - in between the blade neck and the main
straight part of the paddle.

I have found with some AT paddles that the shaft is kind of slick -
waxing up the grip area with some surfboard wax helps make the grip
tackier - which means that you don't have to grip it so hard. The
forearm is what pumps out when you grip too tightly.

And, it could be that, for your anatomy, AT's bent shaft design just
isn't right for you. Bent shafts are basically designed to allieviate
stress in the wrists - if you don't have any kind of history of RSI
type pain in the wrists - then there isn't much reason to go with an
ergo paddle.

I notice with an ergo paddle that some braces (skulling low, can't
recall if it is on the control or the off side) is actually harder to
do with an ergo paddle than with a straight shaft paddle.

The blade area could possibly be getting to you... the AT4 River has a
large blade (800 cm2). the largest (along with the ATX series) of all
of their blades. Sometimes blade area can cause joint stress, esp.
with a fairly stiff (carbon) shaft.

good luck... try the wax as a cheap mitigation attempt.

Ted

On 02 Jul 2004 19:32:41 GMT, (WILDH2PRO) wrote:

Please help! It's like this: I finally go to a bent shaft (an AT4 River)
design after 6+ years of using straight shaft kayak paddles and find myself on
Virginia's Whitetop Laurel (a personal first 'D'!) after extensive rains last
Saturday. Somewhere about halfway through the 13-mile run--a fine choice for
an inaugural run with my new paddle, I might add, or so I thought--I began
feeling a pronounced pain in my right (power side) elbow, concentrating towards
the outside of it. Next morning the pain was so intense I had to lay off of
paddling--ARGGGHH! Vitamin "I" didn't even help, and {unfortunately} there
were no more potent pharmaceticals available. Day after, I paddled the
Nolichucky and by the time I took off my elbow had swollen to about the size of
a tennis ball! I THOUGHT I was gripping it correctly, basically where the
shaft enters the first arm of the "V"...is this wrong? Didn't run into any
trouble on either rivers, didn't hit it on any rocks--what gives? It's a 200cm
paddle but I am 6'4" with fairly long arms...could the paddle still be too
long? Over the years I've actually been steadily shortening my paddle lengths,
I started up around 206cm!! Maybe it's time to go with a 196 or 198?? Any
suggestions are appreciated (and DON'T say "give up paddling", pleeeze!)

Jeff Oxley
Recovering aqua-holic--and relapsing again (full time)
Editor, Blue Ridge River Runners (part time)