Whitewater Freestyle

Tygart Huck Hole (6.9mb)

Tygart Huck Hole (785kb)

This past friday, on my quest for water in good ‘ol West “by god” Virginia, I decided to head out to the Arden section of the Tygart with my buddy Ryan; we found that, as the gauge said, it was very low, especially for this time of year.

We hit up Galloway Beach, which is said to be in between roughly 5′ and 6′ on the Philippi gauge (I like it best at 5.6′ and up). The level on Friday (March 24th) was about 850cfs (4.85′), which made Galloway a bit shallow to do anything but hit rocks and bang up your boat.

So, expecting a mellow day on the river with little play, we headed downstream. I was not expecting anything more until I found this little hole.

I am not sure if anyone has “discovered” this hole or not, but I thought I would put the word out. It is located just above Undercut Rock Rapid on the river right hand side. It has a small eddy so you can do endless laps, and there is a place to park your car right next to the spot on the road.

It is a tiny little huck hole where you can throw ends for days. It is best to do lefties, however righties and both splits are possible. If you are good, you can get cleans and supercleans, low angle rightly blunts, and, if you are someone like Calef Letourney who can Tricky-whu in their sleep, I’m sure those would be possible as well (LRL). When I was there, it was hovering around 845cfs on the first day, then about 900cfs on the day pictured.

Please note that this hole is nothing spectacular at all. It can not hold a candle to Galloway Beach at a good level. It should just be used as a place to huck some ends when nothing else is running (you hit on loops here). Also note that it is above Undercut Rock rapid, making it not the best place for the faint hearted (in the words of LVM, If you don’t have the skillz to pay the billz, then don’t go). The eddy is a bit tight, but certainly catchable (I only missed it once out of two sessions). But, overall, a good place to have a session.

I bet this hole is in all the way up to the point Galloway Beach starts coming in. I bet you could go and throw left down to 4.5′ (just guessing…). I figured its a place to huck yourself and get a good workout when almost nothing else is going on.

Pictured here is Galloway Beach at a low level. The normal place to play is on the far side of this picture. Unfortunately, it was too flushy to do much on the day this photo was taken. There was a place to throw a few ends on the close side, but nothing too special.

So, I hope this helps for you freestyler’s in the area. Have fun, be safe, and see you on the river…

Watch the Tygart Huck Hole Video:
Tygart Huck Hole (6.9mb)

Tygart Huck Hole (785kb)

-Adam Johnson