SUP, dude?

“It doesn’t really matter if I wear my shorts or not, since I’m not planning on falling in.”

That’s what I said to my sister on our way to our first (and, so far, only) stand-up paddleboarding lesson.

Famous last words.

Long story short, I fell in.  Twice.  Both times in the relatively calm, shallow waters of the marina.  Where lots of people were watching. Not in the deep, fast moving current of the river where we did the majority of the lesson.  And where nobody was watching.

But hey.  I beat my sister (and the instructor) back to the beach.  And really, that’s all that matters.

Falling into the warm, murky river aside, SUP (as those-in-the-know call it), was actually a ton of fun.  Even though I had run 4 miles already that day, and taken a 45 minute bike class that morning (on a Real Ryder bike, which is so cool!) and I was exhausted, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Would I do it again? Well, that depends.  Let’s look at the pros and cons.

Pros:

It’s so peaceful to be out on the water. It was a nice, warm day, with a decent breeze.  The river was relatively calm.  I’m sure that I’d be singing another tune if it was super hot or super cold or super windy or super busy on the river, but it wasn’t, so I’m not.  If I were a hippy dippy type person, I’d say it was almost a meditative experience.  But I’m not.  So I’ll just say that it was really nice.  And quiet.  I like nice and quiet.

It’s a great workout. You’re on a big board.  On a body of water that has a current that wants to take you a certain direction, even if you don’t want to go that direction.  The only way to go another direction is by using your core, arms, and a really long paddle. And you’re doing it for an hour. And you need to balance on a board.  On the water.  That’s constantly moving underneath you.  So yea, it takes some work.  But you really don’t feel like you’re working.

You feel kind of badass. Ok, I know that it’s not actually surfing.  Although I would love to try that someday, I haven’t gotten up the courage for that yet (despite that fact that I’ve had two ex-boyfriends that were both surfers and who both tried to convince me to go surfing with them.  I’m sorry, but when you’re in high school and college, waking up at like 5 am to drive 20 minutes to the beach and go surfing, then go to a full day of classes, is not at all appealing.  It’s still only mildly appealing.).  That said, you can pretend to be a cool surfer chick when you’re stand up paddleboarding. You still get to carry the board from the beach into the water.  And you get to stand on the board and ride through the water.  I like to pretend that I’m Kate Bosworth or Jessica Alba.  I know that it’s super easy to picture it.  

Falling into the water isn’t all that horrible. It was a beautiful July day in NJ.  The water was warm and it was refreshing.  So what if I lost my balance and flailed around like a baby horse trying to walk for the first time before unceremoniously making a massive splash into the water.  Next time I just need to figure out how to take someone else out with me.

Cons:

Holy wow, it’s expensive. We went for a lesson with Summertime Surf in Belmar.  To be honest, the lesson was a birthday present, so it cost me nothing.  But, if I wanted to take another, it would be $70 for an hour long lesson!  That’s a lot of dough.  I know, I know.  Why don’t I just go out and buy my own equipment if I loved it so much?  I’m glad you asked.  From the little research that I’ve actually done, I’ve learned that SUP boards cost upwards of $1,000! No thanks.

So, what’s the verdict?

A great workout that’s also fun, makes you feel like you’re in Blue Crush, and let’s you get outside on a nice day?  Sign me up.  But first, please pay for the lesson.  Or just buy me my own board.  

You know, Christmas is coming up soon.