Le tour

[morsey]

Cycle fans will no doubt have noticed the ability of the Tour de France to stream excellent aerial views of waterfalls and rivers from helicopters buzzing along the race route. Wednesday and Thurday will show two more days of the Pyrenees mountains, with hopefully more sneaky peeks at the rivers. :-)
Yesterday the end of the race helicam hovered over the WW course in Pau. And they seemed to have managed to make a course with use of rocks and made it look almost natural compared to the almost sterile concrete and plastic courses that are the current rage!



Okay, so the overall effect is still like a Charlie Dimmock manicured garden water feature, but looked a lot less concrete (I know it is hidden underneath the water, and rocks are not normally pointed with mortar in rivers) from the air.

[banzer]

And programs such as Ray Mears, Bear Grylls etc are usually good for a bit of white water voyeurism too.

[Dave Manby]

But Pau and other "natural" artificial courses (if that isn't an oxymoron what is) are not adjustable. Lee Valley and others of its ilk have the advantage of the blocks being movable. If you are going to have an artificial course it would be a good idea to make it adjustable.

[davebrads]

True, but the adjustable courses all seem to produce unnatural water features, especially the very swirly eddies combined with fierce eddy lines. At least Pau looks a bit more natural to paddle. I can't see why the adjustable block system can't be made to produce more natural features, it can only be down to introducing a bit of irregularity to the blocks.

[Dave Manby]

True, but the adjustable courses all seem to produce unnatural water features, especially the very swirly eddies combined with fierce eddy lines. At least Pau looks a bit more natural to paddle. I can't see why the adjustable block system can't be made to produce more natural features, it can only be down to introducing a bit of irregularity to the blocks.

You get the swirly eddies because of the steeper sides which is part of the design to get the most of the water. Augsburg is the worst because the sides are vertical and have an overhang to keep the water in. When Nottingham was designed this was taken into account and was the reason for the sloping sides and the rougher surface. It didn't really work but is a big improvement on Augsburg. Lee Valley is swirly as well but this is really because they are trying to get a quart out of a pint pot. Can anyone name a 800m rapid that isn't swirly that is as "good" as Lee Valley and only has 15cumecs flowing down it. When the Serpent's Tail has around 15 cumecs flowing the eddies get swirly and the bottom right gets really boily.