Perfect for Each Other - Stand Up Paddling & Cyclocross

Before I fell in love with stand up paddling, I used to race cyclocross. Cyclocross is bicycle racing on a closed loop, traditionally done on modified road bikes in a mess of conditions that include mud and sand. It almost always requires you to carry or portage your bike over barriers and obstacles. It's a lot like a steeplechase, but done on a bike with skinny tires. It's an all-out effort from the start line and pain until the finish. Eventually, the pain subsides and somehow you forget about it and think to yourself, I could do that again next week. 

Stand up paddling is probably the perfect compliment to cyclocross racing for a number of reasons. Aside from the fact that some races, such as the infamous Battle of the Paddle, share a lot of racing-specific commonalities, stand up paddleboarding strengthens many of the secondary muscles utilized in cyclocross racing. 

Paddleboarding strengthens your back, shoulders, and arms, all of which are used to either control or carry your bike in a race. It also conditions your core and a strong core goes a long way in cyclocross, or rather a weak core can be a very real racing limiter. Stand up paddling improves one's balance and that can be particularly helpful when riding through peanut butter mud and sticky sand. And by working on paddling intervals, you can work on developing and maintaining muscular endurance in the 'preseason.' And best of all, the preseason for cyclocross is late summer, the best time to stand up paddleboard! 

With mass starts, getting out in front, first is everything, whether in stand up paddling races...

...or in cyclocross racing

Both often share sand as a commonality

 And both often include some running for added fun...

After a lap, dismount, run the gauntlet, then back on the board for another

The infamous Knapp-Time run-up in Steilacoom

And of course there's the collisions and carnage...

Someone who attended a Battle of the Paddle told me they overheard Joe Bark, legendary board shaper, say that he was going to have to repair 17 of his boards after a race. No thank you! 

When handbars lock up or a tire slips in a corner, this is what happens...