Again, short and sweet this week. We're entering demo season, so keep an eye out for all the opportunities to try something new and amazing.
Competition
This Sunday,
Sydney Paddle Surfing Club kicks off its 2015/16 season with the first surfing comp at Palm Beach. It's also a chance to renew membership for the year ahead. AGM the night before, but go easy, 7.45am start for the comp. They'll also be announcing details next week of the six-event downwind series over summer - a mix of offshore and inshore races, all within easy reach of Sydneysiders.
Latest vids
Only a couple of weeks until the
Gorge Paddle Challenge in Hood River, Oregon. The premier event during the weekend festival is the Viento Downwind Run - an upriver run over an eight mile stretch with strong westerlies that oppose the current running from the east to create some awesome swells. And elite competitors get to do it twice. Plenty of competitors are already there, making the most of what the area has to offer. Here's Paul Jackson, Fiona Wylde, Bernd Roediger et al, tackling the local whitewater.
Mopping up the last bits of media about
M2O, here's a conversation with Travis Grant, filmed just before the race. And you get to see plenty of
that board.
Quiver talk
Last week I'd reported on some of the product releases from the Outdoor Retailer trade show in Utah. Here are a few more titbits to round off the coverage.
As part of its 2016 range,
SIC released a new race board series called the
FX. It combines some of the best features of the downwind driven Bullet and the flatwater oriented X series.
This is SIC's effort in the hotly contested one-board-quiver race - it could be argued other contestants include the 2016 Allstar, Naish Javelin, Bark Vapor, DC Ocean Race, Lahui Kai Race and perhaps the 2016 Fanatic Falcon (awaiting further details). Any others I've missed? Although a compromise, a single board solution makes sense to many paddlers (myself included) given the upward pressure on board prices (mostly thanks to the Aussie peso - this week it reached its lowest point against the USD since mid-2009).
Not shy of hyperbole, SIC's marketing blurb claims the FX "screams on flatwater, eats through cross chop, and handles its business in downwind conditions."
Here's Mark Raaphorst exhorting the features of the new board at the OR show.
www.paddlemonster.com/2015/08/10/the-new-sic-fx-for-20152016-walk-through-with-mark-raaphorst/
Futures has an impressive array of SUP fins and keeps pushing the innovation envelope. Here's a run through of their latest releases, displayed at the OR show, including the Ferrari of fins.
Plenty of online talk about the new
Starboard Allstar and its nose. Here it is at the OR show from another perspective...and that concave bottom.
This week's number: 40
Adding to last week's list of good reads, here's the story of two Swiss guys who thought it would be a good idea to cross Lake Geneva in a day, all 40 miles of it.
www.supconnect.com/journeys/paddle-boarders-complete-40-mile-crossing-of-lake-geneva
SUP Media The world of SUP has expanded into many media forms and now includes a regular podcast called
Keep Standing. The weekly recording is hosted by two guys, Nathan Woods and Shane Perrin, and can be downloaded via iTunes or accessed directly on their website (below). They cover a variety of SUP-related topics - the latest is an interview with Slater Trout and how he crowdfunded a book of his SUP photography.
keepstanding.org/ Happy paddling,
SJKJ
SJKJ
> 9 months ago, 14 Aug 2015
