In whitewater — and in life — you have to act decisively, said Chattanooga paddler Micah Feagin.
“You have to be bold and confident in your decisions but open to changing course. If you make the wrong move, you can redirect. The worst thing you can do is nothing at all,” she said.
Growing up, Feagin’s family moved a lot. Her father was a pastor, leading churches in Kentucky, then Illinois, then Tennessee. He’d taken up paddling in college, and their family vacations often centered around rivers: tubing the Tuckaseegee; rafting the Nantahala.
She was 12 the first time she rafted the Class III Ocoee. At Hell’s Hole, the last big rapid, their guide invited Feagin to “ride the bull,” when a paddler sits on the front edge of the raft, holding the bowline, feet dangling over the water.
Her dad worried she could fall overboard and said no. But Feagin did it anyway.