Taster sessions are by far the most common booking I get for my sup school. Whatever guise it comes in and from whatever coach, FUNdamentals, SUPintro, StartSUP, ‘My mate Dave on the local sea front’, the base-layer of the standup paddle population pyramid is growing.

Whether you’re a working coach, or just find that owning a couple of boards makes you popular on sunny calm days, there is always a place for laying down decent technique. Recently, after some brief dallying with my school boards, my brother-in-law bought a couple of inflatable tourers for him and his wife. I took them out for their first paddle on their new boards. They are both super fit so I didn’t want to patronise them, however, it became apparent quite early on that despite fitness, developing a basic skill set for anyone is incredibly useful.

In each session, no matter what direction it goes, there are a few stock moves I ensure everyone leaves my sessions happy with, or happy attempting. What is really interesting for me as a paddler is the knock-on improvement it has on my paddle skills going through the same manoeuvres again and again. Since I started teaching regularly, my surfing and race paddling ability has seemed to increase, despite no formal training regime.

With that in mind, whether you’re a coach yourself or just a paddle nut looking to skill up your mates so they get the bug and come join you this season, keep these key skills in your ammo and fire them out so they can do a bit more than the poke and drift paddling you see at so many hire locations…

THE REVERSE KAHI (CROSS BOW SWEEP)
So, I’m going to assume that if you’re using this to coach a friend, or as part of a refresher of your own skill, you can turn a sup on flat water. It doesn’t need to be pretty, but you can avert yourself from collision and point back towards the shore without incident.  You’re ready for something a little slicker. I love this cheeky little turning stroke, and once you get it in your repertoire you’ll be banging them out all day long. The nice thing about using this as a coach is you can get right alongside your students with this one, and manoeuvre within your own board length without having to fiddle about with paddle transitions.

It’s great for new comers as well as it’s not particularly daunting, and gives them a quick sense of control over the board without having to take high-risk first steps towards foot moving.

The Kahi is also the gift that keeps on giving as you’ll find it super useful in the surf for turning round after paddling out, or keeping a race board moving forward whilst turning quickly and defensively round a buoy. It’s also just bloody good for moving your board safely on a crowded or confined water way such as a marina or canal!

“ What is really interesting for me is the knock on improvement coaching others has on my own skills going through the same manoeuvres again and again ”

Step 1:
Take your paddle out of the water and put it out in front of you with straight arms so it’s across you in front of your chest. I get students to do this, so they realise that there is no hand swapping. Their top and bottom hand remain their top and bottom hand. I’m quite explicit in stating this to them. I then tell them they are going to twist their trunk/torso/top half to aim the paddle over to the other side of the board. I tend to show them this a bit, and get them to think about the top hand opening up, and the bottom grip relaxing a little (to maintain form).

Step 2:
Word of warning, so many people get tangled in knots here, so watch this one. I emphasise again that there is no swapping of grip or hands. Tell your charge that they need to put the paddle in the water on the opposite side, with the face of the blade (I call it the working face) towards the nose

of the board. So few people find this comes naturally, and I have to run through this several times, often just standing in the position shown in the photo for a few seconds, with my paddle just above the water so they can see what they are aiming for. Technique here for you to work on (but don’t baffle them too much initially) is the bottom arm coming across should ideally be punching through straight. It can help to get them thinking about a stretch to open their back muscles up. In fact on an intense paddle or sup fitness session, we get people to stretch out with this movement.

Step 3:
Sweep the paddle in towards the nose. Try to encourage your students to sweep by twisting their body rather than push forward with their bottom arm. The difference being a smooth quarter circle movement, rather than trying to drag the paddle in a straight line forwards. Interestingly, both work, but the drag will unbalance them, as well as being less efficient and tiring. Another little bit of technique to consider here is the arm again. Try and get them to keep it pretty well locked out straight. That way, their larger muscles in the back and shoulder regions will do the work and long term prevent fatigue in the arms.

Step 4:
Options here. Depending on how confident the person you’re teaching is, and the kit your using, you could encourage a full cross bow sweep: remove the paddle from the water at the nose of the board and place it on the other side to add a further quarter circle to the sweep. Or go back to the beginning and do the Kahi again to continue turning the board. I’ve shown the first option. I find that for someone my height (5’8), I can just get away with this on a 10’6 board like the one I’m using. I like to show it to people who may wish to take their paddling into the surf as it’s a great skill on a smaller surf sup. If you’re on cruising kit, maybe leave it there, and get them to repeat the Kahi from step 1 to continue turning as far as they want.

Step 5:
Get off the carousel at whatever point suits. I get my kids sessions to do this over and over again so they start spinning in circles! On an adult tour where I’m pretending to be serious, we tend to do it a couple of times making a 180 turn round a buoy and talk about its usefulness as a paddle stroke. If you’ve got a super balanced person (or possibly a bit of a know it all), throw in a Kahi with the foot stance from a step back turn (also shown), this can be quite unnerving at first, but if we are laying down key skills for people with aspirations in paddling, it can start to form part of a surfing top turn. SUP