The Perfect Paddle

So you are ready to buy a high-zoot carbon fiber paddle and tweak it to make it all yours. Please don’t tell me you already bought one and it’s precut. If you did, skip way down to the taping section. This part will just make you uneasy. If you’re considering a wood paddle you’ll have to order it precut. In that case you need to borrow a paddle to make the measurements and the decisions we’re going to go through.

What’s the likelihood that you’re going to get a paddle that just right for you? A lot better than it used to be, when you had mostly brand choices and everyone said to cut the paddle shaft so the tip of the handle was one shaka over your head. Now you can get a lot more variation on paddle blade width, angle, length, shape and material as well as choices in shaft flex, shape, diameter, material and handle style. But with all those choices you need more than just a guess as to what’s going to work for you.

Let’s get you into the ballpark. Feel free to ask questions in the forum discussion on the this article as well, if I don’t have the answers I’ll go to the same industry sources that I drew the information for this article from. What? You thought I know all this stuff?

Paddle length is critical to a number of factors, and getting it right isn’t easy. Most people I know who have been doing SUP more than a year or two have been through several paddles, mostly experimenting with length, though blade size and shape, and shaft flexibility are actually just as important. We’ll focus on those four factors and toss in the other parameters when necessary. Then we’ll tell you how to get, cut, and modify a paddle to fit your intended use and your personal characteristics.

You’ll need a helper to make the shaft measurements. the easiest and most accurate way is to prop your board (the board you plan to use the paddle with the most frequently) up on some milk crates or some other stand that will hold it higher off the ground than your paddle blade. You can also do it in the water, but it’s likely to be a bit tippy and difficult.

First issue has to do with your intended use. That falls into three broad categories: Surf, cruise and race.

Surfing demands several kinds of paddling–explosive power to get you into a wave, precise paddle placement and angle to help you execute turns, and pulling power to help you punch out through whitewater and peaking waves. The shaft has to be particularly strong to withstand the demands of surfing and the occasional fall across the paddle. Experienced SUP surfers tend to not pay too much attention to paddle choices, but they generally have a “favorite” paddle that they’ve gravitated to, in other words they chose a paddle by using a lot of them, and now there’s probably $900 worth of carbon fiber sitting unused in the garage. Big, powerful surfers tend to have somewhat larger blades. The most powerful sometimes like the huge blades like the Quickblade Peahi. But you’ll also see some powerful surfers with very small blades. It comes down to their preference for pulling into a wave. Some like to make a few powerful strokes. Some prefer a higher cadence. A higher cadence makes it easier to catch more marginal waves, while those that wait for the big, perfect faces can enter the wave with one or two hugely powerful strokes.

If you are a beginning SUP surfer, even if you’re experienced at surfing, you will probably prefer a smaller blade, something in the range of 8.5″ wide by 17-18″ long–100 to 105 square inches). You may even prefer one of the super-small blades like the Kialoa Methane (8″X16.5″ — 97 square inches).

The length of surf paddle shafts tends to be shorter than cruising or racing paddles. You always want to get power into the blade, and that means you want your arm no higher than your shoulder to get early power. You’re not looking to extend the stroke, in fact all strokes should be short, from the shoulder of the board to your feet. Most surfers do not use a punching stroke common to racers (explained below) so a longer shaft is not required.

So measure the paddle based on having your fist at the same level as your shoulder with the blade under the board and the paddle shaft straight down from your extended arms. You can even go a little shorter than that, with your hand down an inch or so below the level of your shoulder. Have your helper measure the distance from your hand to the bottom of the rail of your board. You want the beginning of the upper curve of the paddle to be right at the rail. Mark the point on the shaft to be cut by measuring the distance your helper got (from the bottom of the rail to your fist) from the upper curve of the paddle blade. You might want to check your work by doing a test cut a few inches higher than your actual measurement.

Racing is a completely different animal. Most racers use one of two strokes: Either a stiff-armed press down for the blade from a point a little forward of the shoulder of the nose, or a punching stroke, where the upper hand is initially close to your chin. The paddle is pushed in the water close to the nose, and then the upper fist is pushed out and down, rotating the body to put shoulders and trunk into play. Both of these strokes require a somewhat longer paddle to fully engage the blade in a further forward position. To measure length you should be on your race board, which is often a thicker board than a surf SUP, and you make the measurement to the rail with the paddle in the forward position of your typical stroke. This will generally add 6 to 10 inches to the length of the paddle over a similar surfing paddle. It is a wise precaution to tape the handle onto the shaft with several wraps of helicopter tape (aluminum tape) to ensure that this added length is comfortable and you are not raising your arm substantially above the level of your shoulder to use it.

Racing blades tend to be small to enable a fast cadence. The stroke is from the nose to the toes. extending your stroke back past the legs doesn’t do very much to help your times. Many racing paddlers use a “chicken wing” paddle raise where you rotate your upper arm down to your waist to raise the blade out of the water. Blade control is important in a racing paddle, for that reason they tend to be T handles which give a more positive sense of blade angle than the ergonomic grips.

Shaft flex for a racing paddle can be stiff to medium. If you are doing longer races you’ll want some flex to save your shoulders. If you mostly do four- to five-mile sprints you might want a stiffer shaft. You get more power into the beginning of the paddle stroke with a stiffer shaft. A softer shaft spreads the power out more. If you are trying to lift the nose a bit to get maximum acceleration then you need instant power at the grab.

Cruising paddles are roughly between these two extremes, with the determining factor being the kind of paddling you prefer. You never want to be bending at the waist to stroke your cruising paddle–your body should be comfortably erect. You also shouldn’t extend your upper arm above your shoulder. The stroke for cruising tends to be shorter than a racing stroke, from slightly behind the shoulder to the feet. The retrieve is often done by letting the paddle drift back and up, since the “chicken wing” retrieve takes more concentration. Shaft flex is good, and ergonomic handles work very well.

We’ll add some pictures to this article ASAP, just got to get it done. but for now it should give you a good idea of how to cut your paddle for the kind of SUP you do. a well-fitted paddle isn’t a requirement, it’s just a pleasure.