Sabaudia 2026 has officially set a new record for SUP. Breaking the previous attendance record from Pattaya 2023, Sabaudia 2026 has 936 paddlers racing. It’s a “home” World Championships for the centre of SUP racing: while the sport flourished in waves off the coasts of Hawaii, California, and Australia in its early days, it’s now distinctly at home in Europe. Entries are of course biased toward the event location, but it’s still worth noting just how big Europe’s numbers are: 80% of the competitors are from Europe. Nearly 750 athletes.

Arriving with the biggest team – 138 paddlers – host nation Italy will be looking to maximise podium placements. Their greatest hope? Cecilia Pampinella, who’s fresh off gold medals at both the ISA (European Surfing Federation) and Paddle Worldwide / ICF (Paddle Europe) European Championships. At the Paddle Europe event (Agios Nikolaos), she pulled off a full sweep of gold medals across sprint, technical, and long distance racing. But arguably it was her recent European Surfing Federation win that was even more impressive: she got the better of Esperanza Barreras and Duna Gordillo in a distance race that came down to the wire.

Cecilia opted to skip last year’s ICF (Paddle Worldwide) SUP World Championships in Abu Dhabi in favour of the ISA Worlds in El Sunzal: Surf City, El Salvador. That decision seemed to pay off: she finished with a bronze medal in the sprints, behind Mariecarmen Rivera and Alba Alonso Frey.

The chance to see Cecilia compete on home turf after missing last year’s Paddle Worldwide Worlds, and considering the season she’s had so far – it looks like everything is lined up for her to take her first Senior World Title this weekend. But her competitors won’t make it easy.

Mariecarmen has to be considered the favourite after her unprecedented triple gold medals in Abu Dhabi, followed by gold, silver, silver in El Sunzal. It would be too much to expect a repeat of such a stunning performance, but no doubt she’ll be on at least one podium, if not all three again. Mariecarmen hasn’t raced as much recently, but she did pick up a win at the EuroTour’s Royan SUP Festival, Le Week-End de la Glisse in France. The event didn’t draw enough top names to challenge her, and she ended up winning by more than 5 minutes with a time that would have placed her close to most of the men’s field.

From the always-robust Team Spain, Alba Alonso Frey and Duna Rodriguez Gordillo will be hoping to add more world medals to their extensive collections. Both Alba and Duna made it onto virtually every podium they went for. Alba took a silver (sprint) and two bronze medals (distance & tech) Abu Dhabi, and silver (sprint), bronze (distance), and copper (tech) medals in El Sunzal last year. Duna took two silvers (distance & tech) in Abu Dhabi, and gold (distance) and bronze (tech) in El Sunzal. Both are consistently right near the top, particularly Alba in the sprints, and Duna in distance and tech. Surprisingly, Alba is still searching for her first Paddle Worldwide gold medal. Perhaps 2026 will finally be her year.

Flying over from the US, Seychelle may be just a few months postpartum, but she’s looking as fit as ever. Going into last year’s Worlds pregnant, she said any good results would just be the cherry on top since her focus had been the pregnancy. She still delivered: a bronze medal in the sprint race behind Mariecarmen and Alba. Most recently, she showed she’s back in great form again when she got a hat trick at the 2026 USA SUP National Championships in September: gold across sprint, technical, and distance races. Seychelle may not be in “peak performance shape” (self described), but don’t underestimate her: she could still sneak onto the podium, particularly in the sprint and technical racing.

Specialists to watch out for in the sprints include Hanna Kaminska from Poland, who’s fresh to the open category after winning bronze as a junior last year behind Claudia Postiglione and Alexia Soto. Part of the formidable Spanish contingent, Alexia is also newly graduated from junior racing and one to watch in sprint, and perhaps in the tech racing too. Claudia still has one year left before she has to race in the open category, so watch for her to make a big splash in the junior racing – she’s already made it to the top, and on home waters, gold medals will taste even sweeter. Amelia Moral is part of this same cohort born in 2007, and with a 5th place in the junior women’s sprints last year, she could be a top contender as well.

Last year’s A Finalists round out the top contenders in sprint, including Kyriaki Logotheti (Greece), Juliette Duhaime (Argentina), Marta Apanasewicz (Poland), and Rika Okuaki (Japan). Katniss Paris, 2024 World Champion in sprint and 2025 A Finalist, is missing from this year’s line-up due to unspecified health challenges, but she’s promised to return in full force at the ISA World Championships whenever those are scheduled.

Lastly for the sprint races, there’s a few dark horses who had stand-out results from the heats on Day 1: Skadi Langbein (Germany), Lucia Clembosky (Argentina), and Annabel (Annie) Page (Great Britain). Annie skipped both ICF and ISA worlds last year to focus on a longer lead-up to Sabaudia, so it’s a chance to see how well her focussed training has paid off. Watch Sarah SUPJunkie’s post-heats interview with Annie here.

https://fb.watch/v/5kMfl72i1/

Across all three disciplines but especially in the tech racing, look out for Juliette Duhaime. She finished 4th in Abu Dhabi behind Alba Frey, then flew to El Sunzal and gave spectators the best race of the year when she and Mariecarmen caught the same wave into the beach for an epic sprint finish and a world title for Juliette. The Argentinian is consistently a top 5 finisher in sprint and distance racing as well, so don’t count her out in those disciplines, but tech is where she’s really shined recently.

In both the technical and distance racing, Team Japan will be hoping for podium spots for Rika Okuaki and Natsuma Baba. Frequently A Finalists in tech and top 10 in distance, these two will be hoping to upgrade to spots on the world podium. At the 2025 tech race in Abu Dhabi, they went 5th (Baba) and 6th (Okuaki); then in the distance race, 4th (Okuaki) and 6th (Baba). It’ll be tough to make the podium in such a competitive field, especially with the cohort of strong ex-juniors now in the open category, but perhaps experience will triumph.

In the distance race (and technical), all eyes will be on Esperanza Barreras. She’s the multiple world champion in long distance, and for years now has been almost untouchable in distance racing around the world. She skipped both Abu Dhabi and El Sunzal last year in a decision that left fans missing her on the water, but may have helped open the door to Mariecarmen’s incredible treble in Abu Dhabi. Espe has a great shot at the podium in the technical racing as well, but distance is her specialty. If anyone does manage to beat her in the distance race, that’s automatic bragging rights for life.

The 2024 dark horse Iloha Eychenne is back for the distance race. Famously now, she showed up in Sarasota racing a board she’d never used, after just a few months on SUP, and paddled the entire distance race on her own (away from the pack) to finish 6th. It was a bit of a shock to SUP fans who weren’t yet familiar with the multiple world champion in va’a (outrigger canoe). But they quickly caught up to recognising Iloha as a serious contender. Iloha is fresh off racing surfski at the Paddle Worldwide Canoe Ocean Racing World Championships in Villajoyosa, Spain last weekend where she finished 14th in singles and 11th in doubles in a very competitive field. She’s undoubtedly fit, but the big questions are: how much time has she spent training SUP since her 2024 debut? And will she manage to benefit from the wash train this year, or opt to paddle solo again?

Natalia Novitskaia (AIN) is one to watch in the distance racing as well after her strong start and 7th place finish in Abu Dhabi, as are the same cohort of last year’s junior girls: Cecilia Pampinella, Alexia Soto, Hanna Kaminska, and Amelia Moral.

And last but not least, the young Csillag Kocsis from Hungary who will be a contender in both the tech and distance events. She’s part of the same cohort of speedy young women born in 2007 entering the open category officially this year, but she was already mixing it with the open category last year when she took a copper medal at the ISA worlds distance race. She raced in the junior category in Abu Dhabi and won that distance race, but she finished in a time that would have placed her ahead of open women’s winner Mariecarmen. Csillag didn’t perform at her best last month at the European Championships at Agios Nikolaos after getting hit hard by a virus, but if she’s fully recovered, watch out: she might just win.

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