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Show Wed/Thurs/Fri, June 27-29, 2018 The Park Record SUPers paddle at Jordanelle for seventh-annual festival B-3 2018 BEN RAMSEY/PARK RECORD Stand up paddle boarders race on the Jordanelle Reservoir on Saturday as part of the Park City SUP Festival. The festival hosted seven races, and featured a catered lunch, live music and vendors. An estimated 50 racers competed across five events BEN RAMSEY The Park Record The Park City SUP Festival came to the Jordanelle Reservoir on Saturday, drawing stand up paddle boarders and beachgoers to the shore near cabana 5. Race director Trent Hickman stood on the bank near the festival’s large, inflatable start/finish gate with a layer of sunscreen over his face, and called commentary and encouragement through a megaphone, as he has done for the previous six festivals. “Nice work Richard!” he called to competitor Richard Trump, who had pulled into the lead in the open category race. “Stay with it! Good job you guys, good job you guys.” Each year, the race and accompanying party are held on one day of the third week in June, when snowmelt has filled the reservoir, allowing more room and options for setting the course. This year, the course was shaped like an hourglass. Paddle boarders started at a buoy just off the bank in overhead water and formed a long side-by-side line extending offshore. At the sound of a siren, the racers paddled north along the shore, around another buoy near BEN RAMSEY/PARK RECORD Denise Higgison after winning the open race on Saturday. BEN RAMSEY/PARK RECORD Mike Tavaras, left, preparing to compete in the elite race, in which he took first overall. a small peninsula, then pinched in through a gap in a line of floating markers before going out into the lake for the other two buoys, making the top of the hourglass, and returning through the pinch to the start. On Saturday, Hickman said there were approximately 50 racers running five races: a surfboard race, a youth fun race, an open race, an elite race, and a 10-mile race. As he watched the racers compete in the open race, he pointed out some of the factors that separated the novices from the advanced competitors. “To be a fast paddle boarder you need to have a good stroke on the water,” he said. “There’s more to it than people think, but you can see when the top racers come around, their hands are really well spaced on the paddle, much like they would be if you were scooping something heavy with a shovel. If you’re hands are too close together there’s no leverage.” The trick, he said, is generating power through the whole body, not just the arms, and maintaining a rapid cadence – the stroke should stop at the rider’s feet. “Anything past your feet and you start scooping water up and out, and it increases friction on your board,” he said. And for some people, that’s a bigger issue than others, because the board sizes and shapes vary greatly. In the open category race there were a broad range of boards from a various manufacturers, from those more suited to yoga and lounging, to narrow, rail-like racing boards that more resembled a sport rowboat than SUP’s surfing roots. And that’s a lot of the reason why Hickman likes it – the sheer versatility of the sport. “I can come out and flat-water paddle, I can do yoga, I can go down a river, I can compete in a race, I can go surfing in the ocean and catch waves on a paddleboard, I can go out with friends and go to Mirror Lake and look at the Uintas, I can fish off a paddleboard,” he said. “The sport is so diverse it offers something for Please see Paddle, B-4 AS USUAL, THOUSANDS OF YOU HELPED TO MAKE PARK CITY’S BEST A HUGE SUCCESS! NOW IT’S TIME FOR US TO COUNT THE VOTES AND PREPARE FOR THE WINNERS’ CELEBRATION. RESULTS WILL BE PUBLISHED IN THE PARK RECORD ON JULY 25TH, 2018! STAY TUNED FOR MORE DETAILS ABOUT THE CELEBRATION AND TICKET INFORMATION. 2018 BEN RAMSEY/PARK RECORD Trent Hickman, with megaphone, overseeing the races. a u d i o v i s u a l 8 2018 |