SUP Racing News: How far will they go?
It takes a special kind of paddler to do an ultra, but to do an ultra where you don’t really go anywhere? The racers who sign up for Last Paddler Standing are a certain kind of special. And yet, their numbers are growing.
35 paddleboarders will start this “loops ‘til you drop” backyard ultra on Saturday, and by sometime Monday morning (probably) only one will be left standing as the winner (unless that paddler doesn’t finish their final lap within the hour, in which case the race wins). To stay in the race, they must complete a 3.3 miles (5.4 km) lap on Lake June in Winter (Florida) every hour, on the hour. It’s the fourth year of the event, and its highest number of entries yet. And many of those entries are returners, including a record number of 48’ers.
Each year so far, the race has stretched to at least 48 hours. That’s when the length of each lap jumps up to 4.9 miles (7.9 km), significantly increasing the distance the racers have to cover within the hour. It’s pretty much sudden death for whoever is left, and it’s about this time that the race action starts to get spectators’ hearts pounding.
The elite few paddlers standing by 9am Monday become 48’ers. They’ve paddled more than 158 miles (255 kilometers) with no more than 5-15 minutes rest at a time and reached the long lap. In the first edition of the race, only one paddler made it to 48 hours and became the first winner: Italian Paolo Marconi, who wrote about his experience in “Racing the Quit Monkey”, published in English earlier this year. In 2023 and 2024, 5 paddlers reached the 48 hour mark. Many of them are back again this year to see how much further they can go past 48.
2025 will see five previous 48’ers on the start line: John Batson (2024 “winner”), John Knippers, Lindsey Tilton, Bobby Johnson, and Bruce Smith. And some first-timers have serious 48’er potential, including Yukon 1000 Record-Holder Brad Friesen and SUP 11 Cities / SUP Twelve podium paddler Carlo Arias. It looks like the most competitive edition of Last Paddler Standing to date.
The full race is being streamed live by SUP Racer, head over to youtube.com/@paddlermedia/live to check it out. The race starts at 9:00am Eastern US Time on Saturday the 7th of December, but the live stream will begin from about 8:30am local. Every hour, on exactly the hour mark, paddlers will set off to complete a 3.3 miles (5.4 km) loop on Lake June in Winter near Lake Placid, Florida.
Read the full race preview and learn more about this wild event at supracer.com, and tune into the live stream any time this weekend to watch the action unfold!
