Scott's Head Paddle Games

Scott’s Head Paddle Games in review….

Even with 5 days to go before the Event people started to rock into Scott’s Head to relax and spend the week before in this small Surf Town along the NSW Coast. As Covid hurt a lot of these little tourist towns everyone knew the importance of heading there to spend some money and support these little local towns. That us SUP and Foilers did! The froth was real even week leading to this awesome 3 day event.

The Scott’s Head Paddle Games consist’s of SUP Surfing, SUP Foiling, SUP Tech and distance Racing over 3 days. This year also seen a bunch Wind wingers hanging around and taking advantage of some fun but offshore winds.

Friday see’s all the SUP Surfing events along with the SUP Foil board heats. All the SUP Surfing from the Open’s to the over 55’s in both short Sup and 10ft over SUP SOLD OUT!!! It was completely SOLD Out weeks before the event, which is un heard of lately. The Swell on Friday was pretty small but Fun, the talk was all about the big South Swell that was on the Way and late Friday arvo it slowly started to show up. So the anticipation was Huge for the SUP Surf Finals and the SUP Tech Race on the Saturday.

What we noticed mostly was just watching everyone meet up and finally catch up with fellow paddlers if which most people have not seen for so long due to Covid state lockdowns etc..Was GREAT!

Saturday morning we woke up to a bigger Swell and Wind. Finals time for the SUP Surfing and Foil Final was going to be epic. Everyone was so stoked. ONE OCEAN SPORTS - SUP Tech race in the building swell on the Saturday arvo had everyone buzzing! Tech race took off in a nice 3ft with some larger sets and it made for some good old fashioned BOP race carnage.

Saturday was done and dusted and was a day to remember by all but now Sunday was waited with nerves for the 9km Ocean Distance Race. There was Gale Watching warning and swell warning so there was a back up plan for a river 9km but the organisers to their credit told everyone that the decision was not going to be made until day break Sunday morning. So everyone sleep listening to the sound of howling winds and pounding surf all night EKKK.

Day break came and the call was made to keep true and run the 9km Distance race in a 3km triangle ocean lap. Everyone know this was not going to be easy with the wind howling off shore and swell still hanging around but it was smaller.

Everyone had a Blast!! Sure was a hard but rewarding distance race.

Presso was held on the beach and everything was done by 12pm Sunday this allowed most people to leave and get home by sunday night, however most people stayed on and spent the sunday arvo playing and left Monday. Proving that this event is special and defiantly an event to put in your calendar.

Also one of the best things by the event organisers was giving back to the Local Public Primary School at Scott’s Head for the ‘Waves’ program the school runs to teach the kids more about Surf awareness.

Water Safety for the Full 3 days was by ‘Water Safety Zane Ludlow’ both Zane and Marcus Ulrick spent the 3 days from early morning to late arvo out on the Jet-skies keeping everyone safe.

PICS by Kerry Davenport and Scott’s Head Paddle Games