Narrow River 2023 Summary

After a weather-induced delay of one week, New England surfskiers once again kicked off their season in Kingstown, Rhode Island at the Narrow River Race. Fourteen paddlers answered co-hosts Tim Dwyer’s and Bob Wright’s call to paddle the familiar 8 mile course on this winding estuary leading into Narragansett Bay. For the first time ever, the surfkis would also be joined by 2 single-person sculls – Dan Gorriaran and Betsy Harling. Temperatures around 40 and a northerly wind of around 10mph made for brisk conditions, although a bright sun helped to burn off some of the chill.

Local Mike Florio came into the race as the 4 time defending course champion (including a win last October in the inaugural version of the fall variant of the race), and was the clear favorite to add a 5th gold to his collection. Other podium contenders included Greg Lesher, Chris Chappell, Tim Dwyer, and Jerry Madore. Leslie Chappell and Mary Beth Gangloff would be battling for the women’s title.

At the race start, Dan quickly accelerated his shell into the overall lead, with Mike jumping to the front of the surfskis on an outside line. Countering him on the inside line, Chris, Jerry, Greg, Tim, Wesley, Sam, and Betsy maneuvered for position. Greg soon broke clear and veered to the right to jump on Mike’s wash, but was quickly dropped by the latter. Chris established himself alone in 3rd, followed by Jerry, Tim, Sam, and Betsy. Dan slowly extended his overall lead over Mike, who was more quickly extending his surfski lead over Greg.

As the Narrow River widened to small lake at mile 2, Mike was well over a minute ahead of Greg, who had slightly less of a lead over Chris. In the river proper, racers had been working upwind, but had the benefit of an incoming tide pushing them along, as well as some protection from the headwind. For the next mile to the turn, they’d be facing the wind head-on with no assistance.

Mike’s advantage over Greg at the turn had extended to over 2 minutes. At some point during the initial leg of the race, Betsy had powered by all the paddlers except for these top 2, putting herself in the 4th overall position at the turn. Chris was the 3rd ski at the turn, being chased by the drafting pair of Jerry and Tim, who were in turn being pursued by Sam. Leslie held a comfortable lead in the women’s ski race.

Racers enjoyed a mile of downwind conditions while in the wider part of the estuary, but were soon returned to the narrow section, where they now had to fight against the tidal current. Heading back past the start, the gaps between groupings extended, although the general race order was maintained. One exception was that Jerry and Tim overtook Chris, who joined their draft.

The field continued past the original start to a downriver turn before heading back upwind a mile to the start/finish. From his backward facing perspective, Dan had watched the entire race as Mike struggled to close the gap between the two overall leaders. In the end, Dan finished first overall at 1:04:52 to Mike’s surfski-best time of 1:06:20. That was nearly 7 minutes ahead of Greg’s silver performance, and 13 minutes in front of Tim’s bronze time. Although Jerry had been ahead of him for the majority of the race, Tim managed to pull around in the final stretch. Of course, Betsy finished high in this mix as well – 4th place overall, just slightly behind Greg. In the women’s ski race, Leslie took the win in 1:27:00 – good enough for 8th place ski. Other standout finishes include Dave Grainger’s valiant (but ultimately unsuccessful) attempt to close the gap on Wesley Echols for 6th ski, Igor Yeremeev’s overtaking of Chris Sousa to claim 9th ski, and yet another photo finish between Chris Sherwood and Mary Beth.

Here are the full results.

You can find more detailed race results at SurfskiAmerica.