Out Of Time

Another loud explosion. We looked at each other with a mix of excitement and worry. What would we see up there? We were walking towards Mount Yasur on Tanna, one of the few very active volcanos in Vanuatu which was considered ‘kind of ’ safe to view up close. It was still a two hour hike ahead but the noises were already worryingly loud.

With Friends Like That...

One of the ways in which SUP is unique in the boardsports world in that it’s very easy to teach someone new how to paddle, even when compared to surfing. And especially when compared to windsurfing or kitesurfing.

Kombucha In Chiba

I was in Hawaii when paddle boarding had just been born, or more accurately reborn, but still hadn’t grown up enough to leave its parents, Laird Hamilton and Dave Kalama.

Long Haul Trucking

In the searing early summer continental heatwave, Tuetonic power couple Paulina Herpel and Valentin Illichmann resolved to cross Germany from Dresden in the south east to Hamburg in the north west. Their modus operandi would combine the traction of the locomotive engine with the propulsion of the paddle.

Change For Good

Finn Mullen explains why if you want to keep improving your performance, then you have to keep changing your game and why variety rather than specialisation in training, is now recognised as a positive attribute.

Applied Force

Whether you’re paddling into a relentless headwind, sprinting to catch a race leader, frantically digging for a set wave, or even towing clients back to base, there’s the same dominant factor working against you: the force that pushes back against your blade as you paddle through the water.

Life Learning

To foil, or not to foil, that is the question. Finn Mullen muses on what he has learnt in trying to find the answer.

The Endeavour

7 miles from shore with the end at last feeling possible, I found myself in a spontaneous, unspoken race with Alan Stokes and Ben Skinner. Both career professional surfers, both still in their prime, and both still with a competitive fire that the previous 25 miles had apparently not quelched. They were both quick! I will remember this as the most painful hour I’ve spent on a paddleboard, including the time I broke ribs on the Isle of Harris.

Get Psyched #12 Expedition Red Lines.

Your paddle skills are in place, you’re tuned into your lovely touring board and those distant horizons are calling you in. It is time to go on an expedition! But before we strap the boards on the roof and head for the nearest coastline, what does it actually mean to go on ‘expedition?’

Uprising

Our story happens in France. It involves a trailer loaded with stand-ups, surfboards, foils and all kinds of gear to make the most of the conditions, five young riders and a photographer. A real watersports gathering where there is only one rule: to be in the water regardless of the conditions.

The Islands Of Middle Earth

Sao Tomé and Principe are two small African islands in search of balance on the Equatorial line. This island nation is tiny in size but carries big dreams: Principe Island is home to a unique and unprecedented experiment in sustainable development. Due to their exposure to South Atlantic swells the islands hold promise for surfers, but Carine Camboulives and Manu Bouvet have much more to share than the waves they found.

48 Hours

After working with Scottish gin brand Daffy’s as our drinks partner at the Dragon World Championships in 2017, I am truly a converted gin lover! So, when an invite came to visit their distillery in the highlands, for a day of SUP based botanical foraging, followed by gin making, I jumped at the chance. After a hectic week in the office, I flew north ready for a weekend of Scottish SUPing + gin sipping.

Wind, Waves & Whitecaps A Downwinder In Greece

I must admit, when I looked for a perfect downwind spot in Europe, I didn’t immediately think of Greece. The French Atlantic coast sounded promising. Or Portugal. Until I saw some videos by John and Kostas Spinoulas, two passionate and skilled downwind paddlers who had discovered several downwind spots along the coast of Attika and on Corfu. Wind, waves, whitecaps and warm water. I knew I had to go.

Victory, Everywhere!

No matter what sort of a day you’re having, it’s nice to think that somewhere, some poor individual (perhaps even several poor individuals) is/are discovering the medieval catapulting effect of being sat on the back of a monster sup as the nose stuffs and it pitch poles in the surf.

Return To Glory

We had a date with Puerto Rico. An island known to produce world-class spots and the biggest waves in the Caribbean. Several unknowns await us though: what state would we would find the island in after the hurricane? Will the locals accept us with sups? Was Captain American born on the island? And was the Pina Colada really invented in Puerto Rico?

Hunting Unicorns

The perfect wave, does it exist? Finn Mullen examines the hunt in the modern age and how it can have surprising results.

Get Psyched #8 Heuristic Traps

What does a rule of thumb, educated guess, guesstimate, and plain old common sense have in common? They’re all examples of heuristic thinking: a technique that each of us use quite naturally in everyday life. They allow us to reach an immediate goal without putting too much thought into it, meaning we get stuff done quicker. Heuristic techniques are fine when you’re shopping for groceries for example, but heuristic thinking in critical situations that we as paddlers might find ourselves in, can lead to disaster. This issue, I want to talk about how to recognise and avoid heuristic traps. Otherwise known as, ‘check yourself before you wreck yourself ’.

Just Another Place To Fall In LOve

I think everyone knows that Maui is the final word for people who have at least two ways of propelling their boards across water. If you have not been there yet, you definitely should, it’s not all Jaws and nuclear force winds on the spiritual home of stand up. Take your board and slip into some moments of pleasure.

Arctic Light

This year winter came early for me. I found it in the frozen archipelago of Svalbard; hunkered in the Norwegian Sea between the northern cap of Norway and the North Pole. I have to say it really couldn’t come soon enough; Svalbard is in my heart and I feel at home in this ice world.

Paddle Science #13 Cold Exposure

Why are we so afraid of being cold? As creatures of habit we’ll always seek comfort over discomfort, a couple of pillows over none, hot tea rather than tepid coffee and a windproof jacket over a t-shirt. With internal heating, thermostats, Primaloft jackets, merino wool base layers and knitted hats and scarves to keep us warm, it’s hard to actually be cold these days. When you think of the guys who used to climb Everest, right back at the beginning, they wore nothing other than wool jumpers and basic coats. They had none of the technical clothing and gear we have today yet still faced extreme freezing conditions well into the sub-zeros.

Legends Of The Fall

It’s early July in the Durance Valley of south west France. We’re in the middle of the huge kayak festival and spirits are high as we are about to embark on a sup mission with the great American paddler Dan Gavere and the hometown hero, Frenchie Nico Fayol to run down the Canyon du Fournel atop the Rapid Air 9’6 river board from Fanatic.

Wild Pacific

Just over a year ago, four friends with no previous experience of paddle-boarding set themselves the challenge to circumnavigate one of the remotest islands in the world by sup. A year in the planning and with limited experience on their sup’s, business executives Neil, Meriel and Mark tackled punishing surf, rolling swells and fickle wind changes as they paddled around Easter Island on their Red Voyager paddle boards.

Length Matters

SUP is embracing a new wave of ‘longboard’ style shapes, retro hype or a glide worth catching? Finn Mullen muses over SUP’s latest lust for logging 2.0.

Logging In

I am sitting in a tuk-tuk carelessly sneaking through the chaotic traffic of Colombo way faster and way more dangerously than it should be. All around me I pass by thousands of people looking busy with their everyday lives. Drivers, beggars, porters, passengers, policemen with white gloves, buddhist monks dressed in orange, schoolboys in uniform, street food sellers, and hordes of ordinary people just going somewhere. I wonder what they do all day. I wonder what their reality is like. I came to Sri Lanka to experience first hand the spirit of a country in which everyone these days seems to be interested in.

Endurance

A great shout erupts from the centre of fifty neoprene-clad people clustered on the dark banks of Loch Ness. The wind whips and pulls at the group of paddlers, all of whom are fortified by a dram of whisky, as the sound of Scottish bagpipes signifies the first grey light of dawn. With it, the true scale of Loch Ness stretches out before the challengers, as dark, ferocious gusts claw at the surface of the black water and bands of sleet and rain cut at bare flesh.

Paddle Science #14 - Blood Testing

We can be doing all the right things: for example eating a low carb diet, following a training program, but it is not easy to know if our blood glucose levels are in the right range, or if overtraining is leading to chronic inflammation.

Lost In Koh Chang

If the newly crowned world champion sup racer gives you a tip-off to visit a place, it’s probably worth more than a casual glance. Daniel Hasulyo has just taken the technical race title at the ISA event in China, and if you’re wondering what his training schedule runs like, it looks a bit like this…

Between Storms

It’s deep winter. Boots, gloves and hood are ready to go..., but I have been very fortunate and grateful this year (thanks to some awesome support from my key sponsors ION, Fanatic SUP International and Nik Baker K66) to have not needed the aforementioned items – yet.

Prohibited Items

I’d almost forgotten about the weariness with which airport staff– from check-in personnel to baggage handlers look at you when they see you bumbling your way through departures with a large board bag.

Small Minded: Wiping The Slate Clean

A few years ago I wrote about a perceived ‘eddy’ of lower and lower volume surfing paddleboards spinning away to the side of the sport’s mainstream. A veritable closed shop of elite riders chasing shortboard surfing-esque performance atop pieces of equipment that increasingly resembled just that: a surfing shortboard.