Hey, dude, SUP? … Are you on board? (If you’re confused, keep reading, and you’ll get hip.)
SUP is the acronym for stand-up paddle boarding, and its paddlers offer puns about how more and more Minnesotans are “getting on board” with the sport.
Maple Grove is a city on the first wave in Minnesota. Two years ago, Maple Grove native Rob Bossen started hosting free demo days in Fish Lake Regional Park.
“It’s an opportunity to do something new, spend time outside, be with your family and it’s physical activity. It’s all that wrapped into one,” says Bossen, who started Silver Creek Paddle & Company after reading a 2007 magazine article on the sport’s long-standing popularity in Hawaii and new awareness on the Pacific and Atlantic coasts.
The quiet, southwest bay of Fish Lake had a small ripple of a turnout for Silver Creek’s demo days in 2010. Bossen says there would be five, maybe 10 people experimenting with the sport. Last summer, it was more of a flood. Anywhere from 30 to 50 people would RSVP and more would drop in. “It was much crazier … constant traffic,” Bossen says.
SUP is becoming all the rage in Minnesota, but its heritage dates back more than 50 years to Hawaii in the 1960s. Surfers on Waikiki beach near Honolulu would stand up on their surf boards and paddle beyond the roll of waves, watch tourists surf and then ride the waves back in.
In the last decade, popular surfers such as Laird Hamilton put a modern face on the sport. Paparazzi have snapped photos of Matt Damon, Jennifer Aniston, Lance Armstrong and Kate Hudson with paddle in hand. In 2008, a couple got married on their boards.
In 2011, two men navigated 225 miles of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon on their boards and SUP race circuits have popped up from New York City to Florida and Hawaii. “The sport is just in its infancy in what people can do on it,” Bossen says.
He says other offshoots include using the board for yoga, fishing or as a platform for swimming. “Right now, you will see one person on the lake on a paddleboard,” Bossen says. “I think it will grow to where you will see more, and it’s like kayaks.”
Nelson Muller, a software engineer from Plymouth, bought a board last spring after hearing about the sport from a colleague in Hawaii. Muller works about 50 to 60 hours each week, so when he can, he takes his board out on Fish Lake and other waters. “I just want to have fun on the water – summer is too short,” Muller says. “I’ve brought it out two or three times [last] summer. I have fun every time.”
That enjoyment is something Bossen sees every time someone gives the sport a try during a demo day. “It’s pretty amazing,” Bossen says. “Everyone loves it. I thought some people would hop off and say, ‘That’s a great sport, but it’s not for me.’ That hasn’t happened yet.”
Before hopping on board – wink! – first-timers are uncertain that they will be able to balance on the board.
“If you can stand up on a sidewalk, you should be able to stand-up paddle,” says adult SUPer Dan Krolczyk during a KARE-TV segment in 2008.
Still not convinced? A YouTube video of Bossen’s youngest daughter, Josie, captures her effortlessly paddling across a glass-top lake. “How long have you been paddling?” asks her mother, DeeDee, from behind the camcorder. “I don’t know,” says the sheepish 3-year-old with a wet blonde mop and pink lifejacket.
From playful children to the more serious, weekend warriors praise the exercise as a low-impact core workout.
“It’s relaxing, but I don’t think you realize that you are using all your stabilizing muscles,” says Ryan Campbell, a Maple Grove man who first tried SUP during a Silver Creek demo day in 2011. “When you get off the board, you can really feel it in your hip flexors, and in your abs because they are contracting. You are using your core muscles a lot and you don’t realize it because you are trying to balance. You work your arms and shoulders, too, but it was the core workout that piqued my interest.”
Campbell and his family of four don’t own boards, but that could soon change. His oldest boy, 4-year-old Dylan, is beginning to love water.
“We are a few hundred feet away from Fish Lake, and [we’re asking] why don’t we get one of these?” Campbell says. “It’s a way to get the kids out on the water, but not necessarily have the costs of a motorized boat, and it’s easier to transport than a canoe.”
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SUP DEMOS
Upcoming Silver Creek Demo Days:
May 19 & Aug. 25, noon, Fish Lake Park, 14900 Bass Lake Rd.
July 21, noon, Cleary Lake Regional Park, 18106 Texas Ave.,
Prior Lake
Visit silvercreekpaddle.com for details or to RSVP.
If other summer plans keep you from a demo day, Silver Creek Paddle & Company also can be reached at 612.206.1469, as well as on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.
Other local stand-up paddleboard gear options include mnsurf.com, lakesup.com and more traditional retailers such as REI and Costco.
Local news and information on the sport is available at Stand Up Paddle ~ Minnesota on Facebook and standuppaddleminnesota.net
