Dan Gavere from Werner Paddles reports here about the first ever Battle of the Paddle.
This years First Battle of the Paddle held at Doheny Beach in beautiful Dana Point California could of been called the US open of Stand Up Paddle Board Racing. Attracting racers from all over the world, especially Hawaii where the sport was born, this years BOP pitted racers against each other on a grueling course complete with turns, surfing, beach running. There were over a thousand spectators cheering the athletes on.
The Elite race pulled around 70 competitors and attracted some of the world’s best looking for a chance to win a piece of the 25K in cash prize money. A hefty 200.00 entry fee and a mandatory 12’6” board length restriction kept all but the most committed and competitive athletes at bay to compete in the open class which featured over 250 racers on a 4.5 mile course. There were several age divisions and board divisions available gave everyone a shot at winning something. Weather you were Mickey Munoz in the 60-69/yr old age group, or the 10 yr old youngster I saw paddling on a surfboard this years BOP was a blast.
The race course was brutal! The wind picked up to near 25 mph at times making the upwind sections of the course grueling and painful. It was like scooping Hagen Daz ice cream with shovel-hard work! Lots of racers were experimenting with different paddling techniques including tucking into a fast ski tuck type stance and choking up on their paddles to try become more efficient on the upwind legs. The downwind leg was really important because every little glide had to maximized, and saving some energy to have the explosive sudden power you needed to catch the rollers meant not blowing a gasket paddling to hard into the wind. This was a tricky balance of pacing and racing. My mp3 player helped me keep an accelerated pace and allowed me to take my mind off the pain of paddling and get fired up. Each lap on the course for the Elite class included a beach landing through the surf and a 250 meter beach exchange that really put the hurt on the legs and lungs. I tried not to go too hard on the beach, and get a little drink of my Cytomax hydration fluid while running, but twice I got passed by the same guy who was literally sprinting on the beach leg. I was in the top 10 and didn’t not want to drop any more places.
The last lap of the course hurt extremely bad. I had lost track of the laps and didn’t even know at this point if there was another or lap or even I would make it around another time if there was! I was about to hit the wall and I could literally taste the lactic acid building within me. The racers were visibly starting to fatigue and I could see people falling all over the place and now we were starting to lap some competitors so picking your lines was critical. I now realized that this was the last lap and my last opportunity to gain a position or 2 so I put my head down and dug and dug and kept freaking digging, my heart beat was at 150-160 I could tell and couldn’t do this much longer! I had 2 guys in catching distance and one breathing down my back. I paddled as hard as I have ever paddled in my life on that last 6 minute upwind leg making up about 5 seconds on the beach sprinter in front me. Coming around the last buoy left a mere 300 meter sprint into the beach where a good wave catch could put me in a flat out beach sprint against the 2 racers in front of me. Unfortunately as I rounded that last buoy to starboard, I lost my balance on a swell and fell in, losing my opportunity to catch 8th and 7th place. I hit the beach in a full fledged sprint and just couldn’t make up the 4 seconds that separated me from 8th place. However it didn’t matter anymore -I made the top ten and I was stoked.
The crowd was going nuts as every competitor finished in a full out run up the beach. The aloha was electric as all the competitors hugged and shook hands as the dozens of competitors ran across the line. Congrats to Chuck Patterson for the win and the 10K check he paddled like a madman and deserved the win. Jenny Kalmbach from Maui also deserves a huge pat on the back for winning the women’s class. At 40+ she is setting a new standard in fitness and sup racing and helping to inspire many future women racers. Keep an eye out for next years Battle of the Paddle which some think could attract up to 600 competitors again making it virtually the US Open of Sup racing.
