The Devizes to Westminster creates a SUP class for 2026
England’s most iconic ultra paddling race has finally created an official category for SUPs. After SUP pioneers Emily King and Paddy McCormack successfully finished the 4 day, 120 mile ultra in April as a trial, the event announced this week that 2026 will mark the first year with an official SUP class.
GB Nationals Preview: Racing looks tight for national titles in Falmouth
This weekend’s national championships in Great Britain are shaping up to have some high level racing as the UK’s top athletes look to win national titles and qualify for this year’s world championships in Abu Dhabi and…
Six weeks of non-stop racing around Europe is almost over – who will come out on top?
Between the ICF World Cups, the EuroTour, and the newly announced European SUP League, it’s been near impossible for even the biggest SUP racing fans to keep track of all the action this spring. And for the racers themselves, the questions have been: which races are worth competing in? How many can I realistically make […]
“Racing the Quit Monkey”: Paolo Marconi’s New Book is about more than SUP racing
Paolo Marconi is one of the “original” stand up paddleboard racers. The first year he raced internationally, 2011, was the year that SUP Racer was founded. That’s fourteen years of top level SUP racing. So when it comes to talking about what it means to be a stand up paddleboard racer, there’s not many who […]
Will the ICF’s Junior Races Survive the New One Design Mandate?
In a flurry of rule changes for 2025, the new One Design mandate for SUP juniors was dropped like a lead balloon. All juniors, athletes under age 18, will be required to use a single “One Design” hard board for SUP at ICF competitions. Their stated reasoning? Accessibility. But athletes are concerned, and some juniors have already decided not to race ICF events because of One Design.
The 2025 season starts with a splash
The 2025 sprint season kicked off last weekend in a pool in Dusseldorf. An indoor pool may not sound like the most exciting location for a race, but the SUP event made a splash as part of the larger Düsseldorf Boat Show. And really, in January, where could be better for the athletes than a toasty warm pool facing off their biggest rivals in head to head sprint technicals?
The boundary of possible: what happened at Last Paddler Standing 2024
Forty-eight hours after the race started on a beautiful but breezy Saturday morning, the wind was picking up at Nathan Benderson Park in Sarasota, Florida. It had already been the windiest, coldest Last Paddler Standing ever: when temperature dropped to 50°F (10°C) on the first night, strong racers who made it through the first day […]