Is the SUP industry tanking?

[PonoBill]

Recreational stand up paddling is alive and well in Hood River. But like everywhere else, racing not so much, though we have two events coming up that draw a lot of participants--both have downwinding elements. I've tried surfski and OC1, own an OC1, rarely use it. Besides just the persistent belly fat issue (I don't fold well) I prefer standup for downwinding--I like to see where I'm going.

It was nearly 100 degrees yesterday, so last night the river was full of people, probably fifty on standup, a few boaters, lots of folks just hanging out on the sandbar or in the water. I brought boards but wound up just swimming with my daughter, who smoked me. I forgot she used to be a competitive swimmer. Diane, Elvis (my daughter Elizabeth) and I walked down the sandbar and enjoyed the water and the activity. A local jazz quartet was playing on the dock near the sand bar cafe, and we could hear them while we walked down the sandbar. It was a perfect accompaniment and they were very good. Great night, spectacular town, great people.

Down at the new outdoor amphitheater, there was a rock group playing and food trucks and local breweries set up in advance of the weekend I guess. This weekend is Kite4Cancer, an oddly named (at least to my ears, I'm kind of against cancer) but successful fundraiser, and they were setting up a massive array of tents and towers at the Event Center. We may not have much wind if the heat to the west of us persists, but no one really cares. It's a party.

Stand Up boards are ideal for this kind of lazy summer recreation, much better than boats of any flavor. That's where the market is. Jarvis is ahead of his time.

[ukgm]

Happy story though as I did a time trial on a SUP earlier this week after not paddling a SUP in anger for months and posted my fastest time over 6km ever. There seems to be some cross over what or how much I am not really sure.

Oddly, I saw the exact same thing this very week too. I was actually going to start a thread on this at some point. I don't know what the crossover could be as the stroke and muscle recruitment is different. I did find a little stability adjustment needed for around half an hour or so and I eventually felt some premature muscle fatigue but overall I seemed as fast, if not faster, than ever.

Damn odd.

[Area 10]

It’s not that unusual, in my experience, especially as you get older, and with sports that tax a lot of physiological systems. It’s usually just a sign that you’ve been overtraining in your chosen sport and should cross-train a bit more instead. Once you are over 40, forget really intensive training for a particular sport, except for practicing technique. It just doesn’t work. Train less to improve is a tough principal to follow if you are a “training robot”, so you may have to force yourself to switch between sports, and enforce rest days where you sit on your hands and are left with nothing to distract yourself from the meaninglessness of existence

So, it’s probably time to throw away the training manuals that were written on the presupposition that the target audience was a 25-year old, and start learning the very odd realities of being an older athlete. Getting faster by *not* doing your sport is just one of them. If no-one has written a book on this yet (ie. training for the older athlete) you should: there could be lots of money to be made

[mrbig]

As a 70 year old awful racer, I have recently gone back to Larry Cain and practice slowly the stages of the stroke the way he broke it down.
Also paddling much more frequently, slow
 (comes very naturally), and  longer.
My lungs finally have recovered from my underwater red tide breathing experiments.
Also am out of the House of Horrors!

[PonoBill]

I broke my personal best lap record racing my vintage race car by over two seconds a few weeks ago, after not racing cars for nearly two years. Two seconds is ridiculous, insane, absurd, impossible considering how long I've been racing cars and motorcycles (50+ years) and my assumption that both my reflexes and skill set have diminished over the two-year hiatus. "Not Training" might apply to non-muscle related activity as well, though I get some odd kind of workout racing. I'm physically exhausted after a 30-minute race.

[Bean]

Reminds me of the Viet Nam POW's that reported improvemetns in their golf game after being holed up for yars with nothing much to do but visualize their swing.  Interesting stuff.

[ukgm]

1) It’s not that unusual, in my experience, especially as you get older, and with sports that tax a lot of physiological systems.

2) It’s usually just a sign that you’ve been overtraining in your chosen sport and should cross-train a bit more instead.

3) Once you are over 40, forget really intensive training for a particular sport, except for practicing technique. It just doesn’t work.

4) Train less to improve is a tough principal to follow if you are a “training robot”, so you may have to force yourself to switch between sports, and enforce rest days where you sit on your hands and are left with nothing to distract yourself from the meaninglessness of existence

5)  If no-one has written a book on this yet (ie. training for the older athlete) you should: there could be lots of money to be made

1) if you're inferring that older athletes are over trained due to not adjusting for their aging limitations, that's entirely possible and very common.

2) I don't know how you or others do it but I use software to track my fitness, fatigue and freshness. Once you understand training load, you'll realise that cross training doesn't alleviate fatigue. This is really about under-recovery in general, not the need to cross train. I find cross training is actually better for injury prevention.

3) I'd say this is poor advice. My own experience certainly doesn't support this. Your vo2 max and peak powers are declining - use them or lose them (but increase recovery from any intensity of training as you age).

4) I would agree in general .....but again, I would not suggest cross training is synonymous with recovery.

5) Renowned endurance coach Joe Friel has done this. I think it was called 'fit over 50' or such like.

[SaMoSUP]

I have not gone distance paddling for about 9 months until a couple of days ago. I was surprised that I was still able to hit my average one and two mile sprint times as when I was race  training regularly. I've only been paddle surfing in the past 9 months no other workouts. Been eating like crap too. So basically all that diligent race training I did in the past was a myth.

No wonder I lost my interest in SUP racing. Might still do PPG just for fun if it's still happening this year.

[connector14]

"Not Training" might apply to non-muscle related activity as well, though I get some odd kind of workout racing. I'm physically exhausted after a 30-minute race."

I think I read somewhere that pilots who flew the SR71 Blackbird often lost about 5 lbs on a mission. (while just sitting strapped into a seat much like a race car driver). Would be interesting to see recordings of their heart rate during the mission. I guess if it was a particularly "hairy" mission,  it could have resulted in 5 lbs of shit being scared out of them ):.....Pono......did you have to change your shorts after that race?!

[Bean]

You do perspire at a faster rate at high altitudes

[Area 10]

1) It’s not that unusual, in my experience, especially as you get older, and with sports that tax a lot of physiological systems.

2) It’s usually just a sign that you’ve been overtraining in your chosen sport and should cross-train a bit more instead.

3) Once you are over 40, forget really intensive training for a particular sport, except for practicing technique. It just doesn’t work.

4) Train less to improve is a tough principal to follow if you are a “training robot”, so you may have to force yourself to switch between sports, and enforce rest days where you sit on your hands and are left with nothing to distract yourself from the meaninglessness of existence

5)  If no-one has written a book on this yet (ie. training for the older athlete) you should: there could be lots of money to be made

1) if you're inferring that older athletes are over trained due to not adjusting for their aging limitations, that's entirely possible and very common.

2) I don't know how you or others do it but I use software to track my fitness, fatigue and freshness. Once you understand training load, you'll realise that cross training doesn't alleviate fatigue. This is really about under-recovery in general, not the need to cross train. I find cross training is actually better for injury prevention.

3) I'd say this is poor advice. My own experience certainly doesn't support this. Your vo2 max and peak powers are declining - use them or lose them (but increase recovery from any intensity of training as you age).

4) I would agree in general .....but again, I would not suggest cross training is synonymous with recovery.

5) Renowned endurance coach Joe Friel has done this. I think it was called 'fit over 50' or such like.

Ok, so first thing to do IMO is to throw out what you think you know about training. It’s all completely different in the ageing athlete. Why? I don’t know. But here are some ideas.

First of all, performance is not about fitness as you age, it’s about health. The best way to stay healthy as you age is to take the same approach to your body as you do to your diet: little and often, avoid things that are bad for you, and make sure there is plenty of variety in your “activity diet”. Cross-training in the older athlete isn’t really “cross-training” is about variety.

Why does varying activity help so much? It’s probably because as we age we start to restrict our activities. We “play” less, and we start to concentrate and narrow  our activities both during the day and in our exercise routines. We turn staying fit into something we fit into our day rather than something that was central to our day like we did when we were younger. Increased job and family responsibilities and having things like cars etc all reduce “non-sport” activity as well.

All these tiny little changes in the variety of our movements and activities start to lead to the systems we do use being used too often, relative to others, and we start to build a body that is physiologically unbalanced. Range of motion and flexibility start to atrophy, almost without us even noticing it. And so often range of motion and flexibility are the scaffolding of power in sports.

This likely happens at a neural level too. “All work and no play make Jack a dull boy”? It’s the same with physical activity - “all training and no fun activity make Jack’s body (and the neural circuits that support it) bored and tired”. Give your body and brain a lot of variety in its diet. It will reward you with better performance.

So, overtraining in the older athlete is often not about “overtraining” as you are thinking about it. It’s about health. Put your body under constant pressure and little variety and it won’t matter what measurements you are taking or what your are monitoring. It will start to protect itself. You will plateau. And health will decline. Restore your health by playing - just doing everything and anything active, and try not to get competitive about it. Maybe even throw away your heart rate monitors, training diaries and all that crap. They only tell you what you already know anyway. Just do it for the sheer fun of it. Play - it shouldn’t feel like “exercise” at all. And then when you do come round to your competitive activity again, having built a healthy and well-balanced and rested body, you will find yourself performing at a higher rate than if you’d carried on pounding away at your training routines day after day.

Well, that’s my theory, anyway. The link between training intensity and volume and performance is completely different in the older athlete IMO. Do more things to a lesser intensity if you want to perform best, and if it’s not FUN it may be doing you more harm than good. Wherever in your training schedules you have the words “intensity” or “volume”, replace them with the words “variety” and “fun”.

Try it and see

[all~wet]

Hyper critical and insults are what I am referencing, they are not welcoming where I come from, respectful discussion is a more productive way to attract new paddlers to a discussion.

There is no right way, best board or preferred demographic.
Everyone should be accepted and respected for the way they enjoy their paddleboard.... of whatever brand.

People who lack knowledge are exactly who seasoned paddlers should be happy to help..... not scoff at.

Right on! Wise words that would serve us all well across all aspects of life.

[pdxmike]

Reminds me of the Viet Nam POW's that reported improvemetns in their golf game after being holed up for yars with nothing much to do but visualize their swing.  Interesting stuff.

That is interesting.  I used to drive my swim teammates crazy by disappearing from workouts for months, then coming back with my strokes better than ever.  I always told them I'd been "visualizing" (along with "tapering").  And I really had been.  I think the time away allowed some of my ingrained bad habits to slip away.  I'd be a bit slower due to lack of conditioning, but not nearly as slow as I should have been.

[PonoBill]

"Not Training" might apply to non-muscle related activity as well, though I get some odd kind of workout racing. I'm physically exhausted after a 30-minute race."

I think I read somewhere that pilots who flew the SR71 Blackbird often lost about 5 lbs on a mission. (while just sitting strapped into a seat much like a race car driver). Would be interesting to see recordings of their heart rate during the mission. I guess if it was a particularly "hairy" mission,  it could have resulted in 5 lbs of shit being scared out of them ):.....Pono......did you have to change your shorts after that race?!

Actually, I thought my times were going to be slow because I was never scared. I get a little nervous when I'm pushing the edge. One of my mentors in car racing taught me how to "hustle" a car in a corner.  That means pushing mid-corner speed to the point that you have no edge left to push. I didn't think I was hustling, but my lap times were remarkable.

I changed up a few things lately--foiling, learning to kitesurf again, adding some heavy weight training, improving my TIG welding and metalwork skills. Who knows, maybe it all helped.

[pdxmike]

I believe that the future of SUP would be better served by a supportive and nurturing community, rather than hyper critical elitists, that seem to have no limit....

Can't we/shouldn't we have both ? Isn't that the point - i.e. to be inclusive ?

I agree with STC's view, but that's an insightful reply, in its own logical-but-not-necessarily-great-that-it-is way.  There was a Star Trek episode where Kirk caused a robot who was taking over the ship to self-destruct by telling it something like that.  It also reminds me of my friend getting in an argument with his 12-year-old daughter.  "Why do you have to argue about everything I ask you to do?"  "Well, Dad, if you'd read Chapter 3 in your Brazelton book, you'd know that rebelling against my parents is a normal developmental stage for my age.  What would be a real problem would be if I WASN'T arguing".


And that reminds me of the teenager who got in an argument with his dad, and stomped out of the room yelling, "And one more thing.  Jim Morrison is waaay overrated!"  "How many times do I have to tell you?  Don't slam the Doors on your way out!"