I'm not paddler but been practicing and studying kayak paddling videos for the what I figure will be 8-10 miles of Harlowe portion. Forward stroke only, nothing fancy! I've made my kayak paddle in 2pc with relatively short shaft, primarily not for function, but to save on weight and space on forward deck (took clay mold off a friends werner sherper). Now different than Kayak, is that when paddling I am just sitting atop windsurfer deck, so have no gunnel, and literally only about an inch of freeboard.. I can place a rod, under my forward dry bag, to give my feet asbase to allow my torso to dig in.
My question is, that with this short shaft my hand are just about at the top of the paddle, I imagine that with my hand that close to the "load" as fulcrum point and my torso powering the leverage farthest away, it actually must be good physics/placement, yet when I look at all the different training videos it appears that the hand on all these is quite distance from paddle. Wondering if this is best physics for paddle, or if it has more to do with the height of the freeboard on kayaks....???