What do you need to run the Green? A Boof stroke?, yeah; A strong offiside roll? & I guess that would come in handy when you can't roll up on your strong side. A creeker? yeah. A full face? ;maybe; ;A resume of creek runs? ;maybe; ;A good guide, for sure.; I;ve been trying to get my cherry popped on the Green for some time, when I first moved ;here everyone I met wanted to take me down, knowing that they;ve never paddled with me.; The funny thing was, I;ve never ever paddled with them, just talked about the Green in passing.; This river, by conversation alone can inspire many.; Being around town for the Green race is ;a little exciting from hearing all the publicity, seeing all the boats pass on 26 or driving around town you know something is up or about to go down.; Having lived in my boat all summer and getting much experience on the Upper Yough,; Ocoee, Cheoah, and yes the Pigeon…mad Pigeon runs I decided to run the Green.; The only thing running with consistency is the Green.; So the last Cheoah release, I volunteered to guide some peeps down for their first time.; I figured this would be a good test for reading water, going over some big drops, and being a responsible paddler.; We all had a great day.; Now I am thinking, ;run the Green;.; After many attempts, everything worked out.; My gracious guide was finally stoked about showing me down.; The funny thing was, he was showing 3 others down the same time, Jason, Brian, and myself.; On the way to the put in I was looking to take a crap but no avail.; Jason was farting like crazy, so I knew I was not the only nervous one.; We walked down and put in.; Our guide promised us that we would scout everything and get out our boat at most every rapid.; I was comfortable, until we got to Frankenstein.; We opted to take the slot move instead of the easy race line.; After seeing one person get blown out of the eddie in the middle of the rapid, I wanted to walk.; But I ponied up and nailed my line.; Our guide was glad that I ran it, because he said ;It doesn;t get any easier;.; My confidence was on, and I was ready to sleigh dragons.; We ran everything onto Zwicks where I dropped into the bottom hole sideways and came out smellin like a rose.; One person in our group, almost got windowshaded in the top hole, that was kind of scary.; Portaged Chief, although it does not look that hard, just bad consequences.; The seal launch to Gorilla is the scariest thing ever! But we all nailed it, I was in the eddie behind scream machine and got blown down the left line of Nieces Pieces, wow was I puckered, this was the most fun I;ve had in a kayak until Rapid Transit.; Next up was Rapid Transit, our guide just told us not to go into the wall on the right, and not into the under cut house size boulder on the left.; WOW! This rapid is going to keep me coming back again and again.;; Someone in front of our group nailed his face on the wall and got major bloodied up.; Be careful here.; We portaged to the bottom of Sunshine, wow this rapid is amazing just a magical place.; The rest of the run was smooth until we got to Hammer Factor, crap this rapid can work people.; All members of our group smoothed it, there is a sweet line in here you just have to go for it. Then next up was Colonel Dicks, this rapid sucks right now.; This was the only place I messed up.; I pitoned off the piton rock and was heading straight for colonel dicks rock, when I decided to boogie far left at the last minute.; I was lucky to have made that move, otherwise I would have flipped in a shallow, bony mess of crap.; Some people call this ;West Prong; rapid, but it sure looks like Colorado road blast creeking.; You need some quick moves in there.; We ended up thanking our guide and getting him drunk and full at the Westville Pub.; I hope to show other Ohio Boaters the lines on the green.;; This is a great place. ;No serious carnage, none of us even got wet.; The level was a true 100%, 6 and half, this is a pretty good first time level, others call it a summer low.; I think it could have used some more water, but I don; want to push anything.; And yes, you should buy a green key and go get The Green Race Movie by Chris Galloway

zElGuapo