Blog de Puree

When I was a collegiate rower, I remember lugging my coach’s heavy launch with a deep keel from the boathouse to the dock. The coach had to watch how fast he was going so that he didn’t create a wake that interfered with the rowers boats. My senior year, we upgraded to a flat-bottom boat, which seemed to create a shallower wakeand was more fun to ride over waves with.

A year after I graduated, when coaching for a community rowing program at Boston University one summer, I saw what was billed as wakeless coaching launches on the Charles River. Harvard and MIT coaches zipped around on double-hulled, outrigger launches that sat on two long pontoons, like a catamaran. The stern of the pontoons extended past the launch’s engine, thus subduing the majority of the boat’s wake. I thought that was the ultimate launch, until now.

Xeno Muller, Olympic rowing medalist and indoor rowing expert blogged about purchasing a MOKAI, a jet powered kayak that is lightweight, comes with wheels for carrying and is great for kayaking, fishing, hunting, exploring—and coaching—in coastal and inland waterways. The MOKAI is constructed from a high-impact polyethylene plastic and judging from the pictures, gives off little wake at slow speeds. It seems like a great lightweight craft for rowing coaches who need a mobile alternative to the traditional launch.

Here’s a photo of the Mokai, from Xeno Muller’s Web site.