Hi gang, I'm about to pull a trigger on an SUP, however I am torn on what size to go. I have ridden a 10' with ease, however I want to go as small as possible (storage, transporting to beach, maneuverability tc.) Has anyone ridden a SUP in the 8'-9" range? Would anyone recommend going that small if I went 31" wide and 4 1/2" thick?
thx a million
Try one first if you can. They are riding sub 8ft boards here in Hawaii. How much do you weigh? If you can paddle it, go for it!
Anything less than 9' x 29" is going to spend all your energy just trying to balance and paddle to get on the wave unless you are like 150 pounds. At 200 pounds I typically ride my 10' with no effort and my 9' in decent waves. If your worried about portability you should just stick with regular surfing..SUP is about being able to catch a wave way before anyone else can and riding small stuff and out of the prime regular surfing spots. You need SIZE to do it and a decent paddle...start out with something slightly bigger than you think and you will have a great time fine tuning your ability, then get a smaller board.
More important than length is width.
31" wide is in the stable zone. Check out www.standupzone.com for more details.
whats the worst that can happen. try it! you only live once
need your height and, more importantly weight to make that call. i’m 6’3 and 210 lbs and never ride boards over 9’. my go to board now is 8’6 x 29 1/2 x 4 3/4. i don’t do flatwater stuff – only wave riding and must say smaller is a whole lot better.
this is an example of a short but very stable SUP i made for a customer recently. it’s 8’ x 30 1/2 x 4 1/2. based off a mini-simmons with hulled entry and double concave to V out the tail. for as short as it is, you can’t believe how much stability it packs. and for as wide as it is, you can’t believe how well this thing surfs.
you’d be surprised at how quickly you can get comfortable on a shorter board. and once you do, you’ll never look back.
kirk
L41 surfboards, Santa Cruz, CA
Width is all the matters. I’ve zeroed in on 29 1/2 as my magic width. I can surf anything 29 1/2 wide and they all have near the same stability. My current stick is 7’8 x 29.5 and I’m 190 lbs.
My take
120-160 lbs 28.5 wide
160-190 lbs 29.5 wide
190-220 lbs 30.5 wide
220-240 lbs 31.5 wide
For experienced SUPers.
You never mentioned how big you are and what you are going to be using it for. All those things are extremely important, if you want to get the right board designed for your needs and or goals.
im not much of a SUPer but i built a 7’6" x 31 3/4"x 5" and it is pretty stable. im not good at SuPing and i was almost catching waves with it first time out at sano. i am in so cal for the week if u wanna try it out let me know.218 820 8449 jesse
I'm 5'10" 160 and have been surfing for 30 years and I have surfed in amatuer contest my whole life. My goal with getting a SUP is to be able to get in the water everyday. So I want to surf it, and still be able to cruise around still water.
From the wonderful responses, it appears you can go smaller in length as long as you keep it wide and thick enough.
i ride a 10' x 30" x 4.5" and it is great surfing or on the river. it has a 'shortboard' type outline as opposed to a round nose longboard style. the pulled in nose helps a lot getting through the waves. you could probably go down to 9' without losing too much. the others are correct - width seems to be much more important in the stability department. the length will give you glide to cover more distance with each stroke. the shorter you go, the more manueverable on the wave but the slower on the flat water.
