total SUP Awards 2024 What’s the Data

We usually don’t like to pick apart other peoples work, but this time it is a bit different. In fact it, is not so much about the work itself but rather the data itself. Total SUP is holding an annual readers choice award in multiple different categories, ranging from athletes to brands. We were initially not going to do this write up, but after finding some validation on our initial thoughts when looking at the results, we then decided to take a closer look a the data.

The entire idea to write something was sparked off by the Facebook post captions of Total SUP:

“….some of the results are truly astonishing to say the least!”

We could not agree more and validated that thought as a comment on the Facebook post. Mathieu Astier from totalSUP responded accordingly:

“Stand Up Magazin some, not all. If you follow the SUP scene closely and particularly the SUP Racing scene, it’s a pretty good reflexion of the pushing new talents, territories and popular formats (especially the Ultra Long Distance scene). Conclusion, it’s not just about Elite racing. The votes are also partly reflective of where the trends are. Next year though, we’ll have a jury choice + people’s choice as the best way to confront both views.”

We responded:

“Mathieu Astier 100% agree read the results with great interest and see it the same way. Trends and regions where the most votes come from. Might do an analysis piece on it, interesting data. Jury is a good idea so it’s not just a voting / popularity contest.”

So here we are looking at some numbers and regions where people voted the most. Also notably is, that according to Total SUP, the total amount of votes was in the neighborhood of 150K. This is an impressive number and shows that there are many people engaged in what is happening. We might estimate the real number of people who regularly SUP and race is far greater.

These were the votes

We think we might all agree that these names were not the ones that come to mind first, but again these awards are reader choices and not based on performance data. Total SUP did comment the results as follows:

“Notably, the athlete widely regarded as the #1 female paddler in the world right now—Spain’s Esperanza Barreras—finished 4th in the voting, despite securing two new ISA and ICF world titles along with two silver medals in 2024. This serves as a reminder that, with the current voting format, the TotalSUP Awards reflect not only performance but also the strength of an athlete’s fan base and ability to rally support.”

We like to ad that we are very impressed with the amount of votes went too Greece, overall there are over 2000 votes for the Greek athletes. A sign of strength in the sport in that country. It does coincide with the strong showing of Greek athletes at the ICF in Sarasota. It shows the continuous growth in eastern Europe and evidently in Argentina. We must not forget, the PAN AM Games are pretty big and the inclusion of SUP brought the sport forward in South America.

Despite people saying SUP is fading hard in the US, the poll numbers speak a different language. Ultra Longdistgance paddlers received a good amount of votes. Interest amongst readers in the US in these paddlers is strong and Ultra Longdistance draws quite a bit of interest. We are glad that Shuri Araki is voted number one and for sure the best paddler right now and best known.

SUP Coaches

1. Anton Sans + Pablo Pérez – SUP MERA (21.28% – 830 votes) 
2. Roberto Mandoloni – Italian SUP League (16.44% – 641 votes)
3.  Mario Tagarelli – SUP Academy Taranto (8.95% – 349 votes)

Italy and Spain are strong in SUP Coaching as it shows with the juniors. There is nothing else to comment on our side, but we do know that Spain and Italy are both putting energy into the youth of the sport.

Eastern Europe on the rise. Matei Barbu is the kid that came out of nowhere winning the junior sprints in Sarasota. He must have many followers to get such an outstanding amount of votes. Same for Hanna Kaminska, she did well in Sarasota and received an impressive amount of votes. Looking at the 6 names above and all the votes castet we can see the excitement surrounding these young athletes, particularly in the eastern part of Europe.

BEST EVENT OF THE YEAR

1. SUP Cup Kemer (Turkey) – (66.65% – 10,054 votes) 
2. Lake Ohrid SUP Crossing (North Macedonia) – (13.28% – 2,003 votes)
3. Zavidovo SUP Challenge (Russia) – (2.45% – 369 votes

The most astounding here is that a rather unknown (unless we have been living under a rock) in Turkey get over 10k votes. We did not know SUP was THAT popular in Turkey, but according to totalSUP the event had over 300 participants and the amount of votes can also be attributed to: ” The event was a big hit, and the large number of votes can likely be attributed to the active support from the Turkish SUP community, including the event organizer, who is also the admin of a well-followed Turkish SUP Facebook group.” …totalSUP

The Brands

Paddle Brand

1. Black Project (38.7% – 678 votes)
2. QuickBlade Paddles (22.66% – 397 votes)
3. Starboard (15.58% – 273 votes)

This one is very interesting category looking at it as a whole. The legacy brand Starboard is in all of the categories as they are covering a broad spectrum of products and are leading the charge in almost all of them. What stands out is that a small brand from Brazil is the most popular SUP Racing brand overall. A clear indicator that SUP is well and alive in Brazil. Also interesting are the legacy names in the SUP Foil category. These brands are big companies with a large product range, but not necessarily at the forefront in the development of foil products.

Conclusion

It is great to have such an end of year voting event. All participants in the SUP Universe deserve recognition. As it was said in the beginning, awards based on pure voting turn into a popularity contest and the ability to rally fan to vote.

Congratulations to all who made top 3 three and all of them who got them there. The SUP community is well and alive.

Apart from an online award, how great would it be to have a SUP Race Season Finale at the end of the year with a real award gala dinner. A real event with red carpet, food and athletes honored based on their annual performance and an additional readers choice award. Most sport have something like this at the end of their season.

Needless to say that our sport won’t have something like this in the near future. The chances to find a sponsor for such a Gala Award Night are equal zero.

For now we are looking forward to this 2025 race season and see who emerges on the top.