Transcription of Rafael Adams for the show Summer Fare #45
Dr. Lisa: As part of today’s Summer Fare show, we have with us Rafael Adams of SOPOSUP. What does SOPOSUP stands for, Rafael? Welcome.
Rafael: Thank you. SOPOSUP stands for South Portland Stand Up Paddling so we are a shop in South Portland. We’ve been open for about a year and a half now and we teach stand up paddleboarding to people. We do rentals. We have a lot of fun classes too, things like yoga. We do fishing on stand up paddleboards. Everyone who works at SOPOSUP also does a lot of surfing on paddleboards and we sell paddleboards.
Genevieve: I first went paddleboarding with you about a year ago for an article in Maine Magazine. I think it was the July issue of last year on surfing and I wanted to put in a piece about stand up paddleboarding because it’s something that a beginner can do. Actually, anyone can get on a paddleboard. What was the youngest and oldest person that you’d …
Rafael: I’ve had people I think anyone as young as even two or three on a paddleboard with an adult. I’ve had a woman take her mother who is 86 out on a paddleboard so they did that together. I had a woman just call back before I came in here today and she said, “You know, I’m older. I’m 65. Can I do this?” I asked her if she could clean her kitchen basically. If you can clean kitchen, you can probably stand up paddleboard so she could do it.
Dr. Lisa: Why are older people or younger people, why are people drawn to stand up paddleboarding?
Rafael: I think when people first see somebody paddleboarding across the water, they’re just like, “Wow, that looks amazing. It looks like that person is literally just gliding across the surface of water.” It looks like something that just doesn’t seem possible in some way and then when they find out how easy it is and how healthy it is, how simple it is, they think, “Well, maybe I should try that. Maybe it’s something that I could do.”
Dr. Lisa: Is this something that is unique in Maine? Is there stand up paddleboard …
Rafael: No. Stand up paddleboarding really started probably about 10 years ago and it started in Hawaii and it was done by more or less Laird Hamilton depending on whose story you listen to but the easiest way to explain is that it started by Laird Hamilton who’s a big wave surfer who a lot people know about and especially people who are into fitness and health issues.
He started it as a way to just take advantage of flat waves basically in Hawaii. Maybe without riding the big waves, he wanted to still get out there and then some of his friends realized that it was actually a really great training way to practice for big waves because you ride a paddleboard and surf in very similar fashion to when you ride a really small board in big waves. You have to do this big, carvey type turns. You’re not riding it like a really small surfboard slashing back and forth. When you’re on a small board on a big wave, you can’t make very fine sharp turns. You have to take advantage of this giant massive size of water that you’re riding.
So the moves translate between paddleboarding and big wave surfing really well and then I imagine he was just taking it out on flat days. He’d probably take some of his kids out on the boards on the waves that are only one or two foot and it was just a lot of fun.
Then when he did it, other people started seeing that and like, “Wow, what is Laird doing now?” They started getting boards and then it went from Hawaii to California really quickly. I haven’t been to California since it’s taken off but I think it’s pretty crazy in California where as if anywhere near the water and looking at the water, you’re pretty much always going to see at least a handful of people doing it. It’s taken a while to come here. I think probably maybe four years ago, five years ago is when you might have seen the very first paddleboards in Maine.
Genevieve: Rafael, when you took me out, I was wearing a wetsuit and you were laughing at me because you say, “You’re going to just be so hot.” I thought how can I be hot? The water in Maine is cold and I think this was in June and it turned out you were right because you’re actually not in the water as much as you would be if you’re surfing or swimming.
Rafael: Right. A lot of people ask me, “Oh, am I going to need a wetsuit to go paddleboarding?” Generally speaking, now all of June, July, August and deep into September, you really don’t need a wetsuit. A wetsuit is only going to help you out if you’re constantly in the water so if you’re in the water for half an hour or more, even in July, you can be in the water here without wetsuit for half an hour but after half an hour, you’re going to start losing that body heat. It’s just the water doesn’t penetrate the wetsuit. By the time you get back onto the board and the sun hits the wetsuit and you’re basically like cooked, like you’re in a microwave.
That’s another great freedom of it. You’re just in board shorts, a hat. I wear a hat when I go paddleboarding. Some people even get away with just regular street clothes and go paddleboarding once you get your confidence up and feel proud water paddling.
Genevieve: Why did you choose to open a shop that specializes in this?
Rafael: I was a furniture maker before this. I make custom furniture over 15 years, high end custom furniture and when I had free time on my hands, I did quite a lot of fishing and I’ve always wanted to explore some of the other spots, some of the islands that are close to shore and go fishing so I got a paddleboard as a means to do that. I tried fishing on a kayak and I was never really happy of the thing. Canoeing just kind of seem unsafe to me and I was a surfer when I was younger so it was sort of an obvious choice.
Then probably like within a week or two, I explored all these islands that I’ve always been dreaming about going to but pretty soon, I started leaving my fishing rod at home just because I didn’t want to fish anymore. I just wanted to paddle, just the actual act of having the paddle in my hand and moving across the water and three-quarters of the water surface is suddenly basically open to me that wasn’t open before and that’s what really captivated me.
Then maybe about six weeks after I started, I took it into the surf and at that point, I was completely taken with it. I realized that there’s just so much potential there.
Genevieve: Are you from Maine originally?
Rafael: I grew up from Long Island in New York and then I lived in Boston for six years before going to Maine. I’ve been in Maine now almost nine years.
Genevieve: Are there things that people should be aware of before they go out on a paddleboard from a weather standpoint or again from a safety standpoint?
Rafael: Yeah, absolutely. Anytime they go paddleboarding, anytime you go any boarding activity but especially paddleboarding, you want to pay attention to the weather, get a really good forecast. Things like waves or more significant waves and I should say waves and maybe the tide is something you want to pay attention to.
What you really want to pay attention to when you’re on a paddleboard is the wind. You want to pay attention to the wind direction and how strong it’s going to be blowing because when you’re on a board, there’s no resistance under the board which means that it moves really effortlessly above the water and even in things like current, you can negotiate really well because the current literally just slides under the board without affecting it very much but the wind also blows you and when you’re standing up, you’re basically a sail so that wind is going to blow you all over the place.
Anything over maybe like 10 or 12 knots of wind becomes a significant factor. Anything over 20 knots of wind is something that you would really only go out if you wanted to be blown by the wind.
Genevieve: You mentioned classes that you teach at your store. I think paddleboarding is interesting and that it’s a good workout. I was sore after I did it but it also can be very social because you’re on this board and so you can talk so Lisa and I could go do it together and be working out but talking to one another.
Rafael: Yeah. I mean it is what you bring to it. I planned since last summer I’d be on the water probably anywhere from three to five hours a day every day just about whether I was giving lessons or demos or just out if I didn’t have anything going on and know somebody else was in the shop and I have some free time, I’ll be paddling.
That was really sort of casual years paddling whereas if I’m giving lessons, I’m not getting tired. At this point, my balance is pretty good. There’s always sort of this under level of balance issues that you’re working with almost subconsciously but it’s easy. I could do it all day.
There were quite a few races last summer and it wasn’t until probably September that the shop was quite enough that I had an opportunity to take part in one of the races and I had thought to myself I’m on one of these things four or five hours a day. I’m going to enter this race and I’m going to win it hands down seemingly then. It’s going to be like this glorious moment for me.
I did some training maybe for about a week before the race but I guess that’s the equivalent now that I look at it, it’s the equivalent of like training for a marathon for maybe a week beforehand. It’s not going to work. I entered it race. It was in Newport, Rhode Island. I entered myself in the elite division which is the appropriate that I think because I’ve done a lot of paddleboarding. I would have started in sort of like the open division.
Within about 50 yards of the race, I was winded. I had five more miles to go and I realized that I hated racing. In the back of my mind, I was seriously thinking like can I just drop out of this race right now? I didn’t want to do it because I wouldn’t have been able to lift myself in there again so I stuck it out but it’s a really competitive sport already so you can get a serious aerobic workout or if you’re doing what I was doing during the summer four or five hours a day, I’m not really ever getting tired.
Dr. Lisa: We appreciate you coming in and talking to us today. We’ve been speaking with Rafael Adams of SOPOSUP in South Portland. How can people learn more about your shop?
Rafael: We do a lot of work on Facebook so you can check us out on our Facebook page and we’ve got a pretty nice website that details lessons, rentals. We try to do probably two or three different activities a week. We do yoga on paddleboards on Monday evenings and Thursday mornings. We’re on a fishing tour on Wednesdays. We operate our paddle birding tours. That’s another exciting thing that we’re offering so we’re going to be bird watching from paddleboards. I have Mike Windsor, the naturalist at Audobon running that with me.
Just check us out on Facebook. Check out our website. You’ll see a lot of cool events. Events are actually great ways to just try our paddleboarding.
Genevieve: Your website is?
Rafael: Our website is SOPOSUP.com.
Dr. Lisa: Very good. Thanks so much for coming in today.
Rafael: You’re welcome.