JOHN GRACE
KS: How did you end up in a kayak?
JG: Like a lot of folks, my father introduced me to the sport. He and a few friends from Indiana and Kentucky were part of a club called the Ohio Valley Whitewater Club. To this day they are still the most dedicated group of weekend warriors I have ever met! When I was nine-years-old they stuffed my 80-pound frame as best they could in a Laserbat Kevlar slalom boat and taught me to roll. It was instant love.
KS:What is your first memory of a running whitewater? How did it go?
JG: My first whitewater memory is of the St. Francis River in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri; I was ten years old, and it sucked! It was cold, and for those who don't know, in the mid-80s, there were virtually no gear options, especially for kids. I had my step-mom’s scuba diving wetsuit and a hodgepodge of other gear that was so restrictive and uncomfortable I could barely take a stroke. I was scared the whole time, but things were going well until the first class III drop. I remember not wanting to run it, but my Dad persuaded me to give it a go. I flipped, didn't even try a roll, swam to shore and hiked out.
KS:Then what happened? How did you end up on the river on an almost daily basis?
JG: After my teeth quit chattering and I processed what had happened, I was determined to give it another go. I practiced my roll in the pool and we made several weekend trips to the Hiawassee, Tuckasegee, and Nantahala Rivers. I panicked every time I flipped over, never even tried a roll, but had a blast. My Dad and his friends were super supportive. Then one late summer day I hit a combat roll at Surfers Rapid on The Nantahala. From there, it was on! By the time I was 12 years old I had several runs down the Ocoee under my belt and was consistently catching the hardest eddies on the river. Then the next winter I made varsity on the middle school wrestling team and didn’t sit in a boat again for seven years.
I eventually worked my way onto the varsity squad as a redshirt freshman at Indiana University. Midway through the season I
