Day 1 Sprints
This was a special race to take part in. My husband was born in South Korea and hadn’t returned since he came to Canada over 20 years ago. We were long overdue for a trip to Korea, a honeymoon since we had gotten married last summer and lucky for me this race was happening while we were there!
The event was very well organized, it was a festival complete with an opening ceremony, numerous tents lining the beach as well as fun activities for both spectators and athletes.
The opening ceremony had all the pro athletes come in with their country’s flags which were all provided to us with string to tie them to our paddles, smart. There was a traditional Korean farmer’s dance/drumming performance that was put on to wish everyone luck at the event. It is traditionally done to wish farmers a good harvest. A very talented group of University Taekwondo athletes performed their most daring skills complete with standing on one another’s shoulders while another runs up their bodies to kick a target over 10 feet in the air.
The sprint technical race was 300m on an “M” shaped course with 3 buoys, beach start and beach finish. We had a heat, repechage and three finals for the women. I was the only rookie and came 5th overall in the pro. There were 5 women competing, two South Koreans, an Australian, an Argentinian and myself. I was really disappointed that we did not have more competitors in the women’s category and was really glad to have entered myself to up the numbers.
It was a long struggle to find an Infinity board that I could ride in South Korea. I managed to get my hands on a Candice Appleby low volume board which was perfect for me. This was only my second time racing on the ocean and it was quite wavy. Watching the men’s races was so exciting because so many of the competitors were falling in and there were many upsets in the results.
In the first heat we launched into the shorebreak which was a wave between 1-2ft and quite powerful. All summer I’ve been practicing a staggered stance going into breaking waves and I’m proud to say that I didn’t get knocked off my board during the sprints. I feel very encouraged to see marked improvement from practicing my SUP skills and it drives me to continue.
I still need more practice paddling in wavy conditions because my stroke rate ends up slowing right down likely because of balance issues. My only regret in my sprints was that I didn’t feel like I was sprinting. The highlight was my smooth pivot turns at the buoys.
My second sprint race was very exciting, I was in qualifying position at one point in the race even after falling in at the first buoy until the next buoy flipped over due to the wind, shifting my path over 1 metre forcing me to go very wide around it. With the wind and waves my wide turn was pushed even wider and it allowed the Australian behind me to overtake me with a sharper turn. It was disappointing that my line toward the buoy which was perfect prior to the buoy shifting resulted in me losing way too much time and missing out on qualifying for the final.
Regardless of how I finished in the sprints I was really proud to have tackled conditions that I’m not used to and raced hard with aggressive pivot turns using a switchback stance.
The fact that the whole event was televised was absolutely terrifying. Knowing that every success and failure was broadcasted for the world to see was a thought I had when I was trying to fall asleep the night before the race. I have a problem that I worry too much what others think, but every single time I’m in the middle of a race I always think to myself, “I freaking love this, I’m working so hard I don’t care about the result, I only care that I’m out here giving it my all and enjoying every moment and all the pain that it comes with!” Okay, that’s not exactly word for word because I find it really hard to remember my races, I tend to blank out. In fact, when I crossed the line in my final sprint, I felt my jersey was wet, looked at my husband and asked him “Did I fall in?” He confirmed that I had. It’s amazing that we can push our bodies and our minds so hard that it alters our mental state.
Day 2 Long Distance Race
The long distance race was scheduled for 9am for the men, 11am for the women. Unfortunately, the weather had other plans for us. In South Korea there is a rule that if the wind is 15 knots or higher, stand up paddleboarding or stand up paddle surfing are not permitted. This resulted in an over 6 hour delay to the race start time and the cancellation of the amateur and children’s races. Their races ended up being postponed to the next day. Now we had the men racing shortly after 3pm (they didn’t end up starting until 3:45pm) and the women starting after 5pm. The course was modified to make it more enjoyable for competitors and spectators alike. It involved 5 laps of 2km each, with 3 flags on the beach to dismount, run around and launch back out in the surf, it was very zigzaggy.
After the men started I realized it took some of the men well over 20 minutes to complete one lap which was quite slow. The women watched the men and we could tell they were getting very tired and losing strength running around the flags on the beach. We were waiting for their race to finish because some of us were sharing boards, especially the Infinity Speed Freaks since our boards were a rarity.
There was another hitch, the sun set at 6pm. By 5pm the men were still not finished racing. The race officials approached us and asked if we would race other boards, we were offered a 23” and 24.5” Starboard AllStar. Juliette and Chloe were racing on 21.5” boards and didn’t feel comfortable racing on a board other than Infinity. We were all proud to represent Infinity and unwilling to give that up. The officials conceded and allowed us to wait for the top finishing men riding Infinity boards to start our race with one caveat, we could only do one lap instead of five because of nightfall. We were all really disappointed that our race would be different from the men’s but agreed it was better than not racing at all.
It had turned into another sprint technical race for us, only 2km and we all pushed really hard. We fell in once at the start from the powerful waves with only Juliette making it out unscathed taking a commanding lead. I was in 3rd place position heading toward the second and farthest buoy. Shortly after we rounded the buoy and set off on our downwind section I was overtaken by the other competitors. They were able to use the swell to their advantage in a way that I just couldn’t, my inexperience in the ocean was showing. Since the sun was setting I could not make out any of the flags on the shore and panicked a little wondering where my line should be. We were racing with neon orange shirts which were thankfully very visible, once I caught sight of Juliette I followed her line to the shore.
At the first beach flag I noticed a couple of the women had fallen in just before the beach and thought “This is my chance!” Aaaaaand then I fell in. Incredibly disappointing. I was in chest deep water wading through to get to the shore, ran around the flag and launched back out successfully but boy was I exhausted. When you do beach runs it feels like an opportunity to make up time but once you jump back on the board you feel winded and disoriented, it’s a real challenge that makes races that incorporate beach portages very interesting.
After the last flag I struggled to get back on the board, I was starting to feel the fatigue set in and held on as best as I could. At the finish I fell in a couple more times because I was tired and I had caught the waves sideways which flipped my board over. When I finally ran across the finish line I felt so happy that it was over and I’d given it my all. I had so much fun riding the waves and paddling against them. I felt stronger than I’d ever felt on a SUP and noticed a huge improvement over last year trying to battle waves on Lake Ontario and Lake Huron.
I glanced at my GPS watch and realized why the race had felt so impossible to complete. It was actually 3km, not the planned 2km. We had SPRINTED for 3km! It was a lactic acid nightmare and challenged us mentally. Which also meant the men did a 15km race as opposed to 10km, no wonder their laps were so slow.
I met so many great locals in this event and connected with fellow Infinity Speed Freaks Juliette and Itzel Delgado for the first time. My husband and I were invited to come back and stay with some of the locals next year to train and compete which is very tempting!!! The Korean commentator announced that competing in a high level event like this was the equivalent of training for 10 hours and I agree. There is something about the high pressure of racing that pushes you to do things that you’ve either never done before or never realized you were capable of doing. We enjoyed the rest of our vacation exploring winding alleyways, hiking mountains and the local cuisine. My favourite meals were Cold Noodles and Bossam.
