Icing on the cake - Daniel Whiteley

Today we had big water beatdown Thursday, which isn't about getting worked in a big wave or hole for everyone. The idea of today is to get used to paddling huge water with almost no dangerous consequences at the bottom. I had a great start to the day on the McCoys rapid by completing the "hero ferry". This ferry starts above phils hole in an eddie called hero eddie. You go from here and ferry across to past left side phils without falling into it which is very challenging especially in a play boat.

Today i was very inspired by seeing a blind man in a kayak with coaches running the McCoys rapid. It was great to know that i'm part of a sport where everyone is accepting of everyone else and always willing to help people who want to give kayaking a go.

I came to the keener program with two main goals, the first was to be more confident on bigger water and become an all round better kayaker from it. The other goal of mine was to complete a front loop on a wave which finally happened today. The front loop is a full forward rotation of your boat while at one point having your boat completely out of the water. This was certainly my biggest challenge for my time at keeners. I can safely say that styling this move and landing back on the wave to continue my surf was the most incredible feeling ever.

After completing this and having no other real big goals, everything else is just icing on the cake.