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Molokai2Oahu History and Legacy

The Molokai2Oahu is opening up a new chapter this year. The biggest ocean race has been absent for 3 years and the SUP racing world has moved on from Downwind SUP racing. The pandemic accelerated the spread for foiling and the trend has reached the far corners of land locked Europe. Before we move on from competitive Downwind SUP Racing, lets look a it at the history and legacy of the Molokai2Oahu SUP Athletes that have created so many great memories for all of us who were involved during this special time.

— To lazy to read? Watch the interview with Andera Moller on the bottom of all the results —

The records date as far back as 2005 when SUP first appeared on the official results. We recognize some names, such a Todd Bradley, the founder of C4 Watermen, one of the first SUP brands and notably also a fore runner in the space of inflatables. Brian Keaulana is a pioneer waterman who is well known in the water safety and big wave community, same with Archie Kalepa who is a great pioneer of water sports. He later became a spokesperson for Olukai and helped organize the Olukai Ho’olaue’a. Andrea Moller was also part of the pioneers, to this day she is a well known water woman, she was the early queen of the channel and rose to fame with her accomplishments in big wave surfing. She will be back in the Kaiwi Channel this year marking it her 45th crossing.

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Lets look at some results and honor those who broke records and stood out in glorious time of Ocean SUP Racing.

2005

11Todd BradleyBrian Keaulana5:42:31
12Archie KalepaDave Parmenter5:45:35
52Andrea MollerMaria Souza6:56:33
74KevinHorgan   9:27:00

In 2006 the participation started to to grow and that gave rise to Ekolu Kalama. He was one of the very early SUP super stars. It would reach too far to go trough every name on this list but you recognize names here that are well known in the world of ocean sports.

2006

1David KalamaEkolu Kalama5:28:36TEAM
2Alan CadizScott Trudon5:59:27TEAM
3Todd BradleyBrian Keaulana6:14:43TEAM
4Archie KalepaDave Parmenter6:31:46TEAM
5Campbell FarrellSean Ordonez6:45:12TEAM
6Nolan Keaulana MartinJason Patterson6:50:48TEAM
7KevinHorgan7:23:14SOLO
8KamuelaAea7:25:39SOLO
9Andrea MollerMaria Souza7:30:04TEAM
10Emili JanchevisMichael Richardson8:00:53TEAM
11JackGillen8:08:13SOLO
12RielCustodio8:15:50SOLO

We are missing records from the year 2007/08/09 but it was not until 2010 when the Molokai2Oahu started to gain traction. We took the time and wrote down all the SUP Unlimited podiums since 2010 as well as the winners of the 14′ class. It is interesting to see who was part of the M2O since the beginning. Some people came and went and some stuck around over all theses years. There are stand-outs, such a Travis Grant who was the only one to ever paddle the Kaiwi Channel under 4 hours, he also holds the most titles. Sonni Honscheid is the only women who won the M2O three times in a row holding 6 podiums. Her first win was a big boost to her careers in which she won many titles .

Terrene Black holds the female channel record. Both records, Travis’ and Terrenes’ will probably stand forever. Connor Baxter was on the podium 7 times and won 3 of them. We remember the great battle between Kai Lenny and Travis Grant in 2015 and 2016. Kai also won the 14′ class in 2012 at a very young age. We remember the young Travis Babtiste who won the 14′ class from 2013 /14/15 then came the young gun Riggs Napoleon and after that it was Josh Riccio who dominated the 14′ class till the end.

We will always remember the legendary crossings and the accomplishments of all the outstanding athletes even if they are not mentioned in this article. There are simply too many stories to tell. If you are interested they are all archived on this web site.

Women top paddlers

2010

  1. Andrea Moller – 6:00:00
  2. Jenny Kalmbach – 6:09:50
  3. Candice Appleby – 6:34:01

No females (14′)

Men top paddlers

2010

  1. Dave Kalama – 4:54:15
  2. Ekolu Kalama – 5:03:13
  3. Scott Gamble – 5:06:15
  1. Andrew Logreco – 5:25:53 (14′)

2011

  1. Andrea Moller – 5:26:51
  2. Tailia Gangini – 5:30:57
  3. Annabel Anderson – 5:34:00
  1. Haile Harrison – 6:24:48 (14′)

2012

  1. Jenny Kalmbach – 5:28:18
  2. Morgan Hoesterey – 5:33:23
  3. Mariko Strickland – 5:34:33
  1. Rachel Bruntsch – 5:49:10 (14′)

2013

  1. Terrene Black – 5:40:40
  2. Jennifer Kalmbach – 5:45:22
  3. Sonni Hönscheid – 5:52:07
  1. Brigette Van Aswegen – 8:55:00 (14′)

2014

  1. Sonni Hönscheid – 5:12:38
  2. Jenny Kalmbach – 5:15:40
  3. Penelope Strickland – 5:27:12

No females (14″)

2015

  1. Sonni Hönscheid – 5:53:18
  2. Penelope Strickland – 5:59:45
  3. Jennifer Kalmbach – 6:08:21
  1. Annabel Anderson – 5:57:40 (14′)

2016

  1. Sonni Hönscheid – 5:01:40 (Most consecutive wins)
  2. Annabel Anderson – 5:17:26
  3. Terrene Black – 5:31:45

No females

2017

  1. Penelope Strickland – 4:52:32
  2. Terrene Black – 5:16:10
  3. Annabel Anderson – 5:16:49
  1. Siri Schubert – 7:10:02 (14′)

2018

  1. Terrene Black – 5:25:27
  2. Sonni Hönscheid – 5:32:36
  3. Penelope Strickland – 5:57:09
  1. Siri Schubert – 7:06:18 (14′)

2011

  1. Connor Baxter – 4:26:10
  2. Scott Gamble – 4:30:10
  3. Livio Menelau – 4:33:13
  1. Andrew Logreco -5:13:45 (14′)

2012

  1. Connor Baxter – 4:13:26
  2. Dave Kalama – 4:13:50
  3. Livio Menelau – 4:22:21
  1. Kai Lenny – 4:22:14 (14′)

2013

  1. Travis Grant – 4:50:17
  2. Scott Gamble – 5:00:53
  3. Connor Baxter – 5:02:02
  1. Travis Babtiste – 5:22:59 (14′)

2014

  1. Connor Baxter – 4:08:08
  2. Travis Grant – 4:09:15
  3. Scott Gamble – 4:19:57
  1. Travis Babtiste – 4:23:54 (14′)

2015

  1. Travis Grant – 4:59:39
  2. Kai Lenny – 5:15:59
  3. Lincoln Dews – 5:19:19
  1. Travis Babtiste – 5:26:47 (14′) (3 consecutive wins)

2016

  1. Kai Lenny – 4:07:41
  2. Travis Grant – 4:10:14
  3. Connor Baxter – 4:16:19
  1. Riggs Napoleon – 4:35:17 (14′)

2017

  1. Travis Grant – 3:59:52 (Record)
  2. Connor Baxter – 4:03:46
  3. Titouan Puyo – 4:14:05
  1. Josh Riccio – 4:36:45 (14′)

2018

  1. Travis Grant – 4:23:15 (Most wins – 4 – )
  2. Connor Baxter – 4:38:39 (Most podiums -7-)
  3. James Casey – 4:48:42
  1. Josh Riccio – 5:01:27 (14′)

2018 marked a turning point in downwind SUP, after Armie Armstrong was denied in 2017 to participate on a foil, the race organizers realized the trend was unstoppable and allowed SUP Foilig as its own division. There were 9 guys and 1 girl.

  1. Kai Lenny – 2:52:58
  2. Nathan Van Vuuren – 3:17:38
  3. Jeffrey Spencer – 3:34:08
  4. Bernd Roediger – 3:43:20
  5. Ryan Funk – 3:47:59
  6. Finn Spencer – 3:28:34
  7. Tomoyasu Murabayashi – 4:57:47
  8. Eric Terrien – 5:19:24
  9. Annie Reichert – 5:20:06
  10. Armie Armstrong – 6:34:36

Nathan Van Vuuren on a board we don’t see like this anymore.

2019

  1. Terrene Black – 4:34:09 (Record)
  2. Sonni Hönscheid – 4:55:38 (Most podiums -6-)
  3. Jennifer Lee – 5:40:16
  1. Mao Kamimura – 7:08:31 (14′)

2019

  1. James Casey – 4:03:20
  2. Michael Booth – 4:08:32
  3. Kenny Kaneko – 4:19:50
  1. Josh Riccio – 4:12:08 (14′) (3 consecutive wins)(14′ course record)

In 2019 it became clear: SUP Downwind racing on unlimited boards was being phase out. Terrene Black and James Casey were the last two big winners of the M2O on a SUP. Terrene set the record for the fastest female and James Casey paddled the 2nd best time ever behind Travis Grants record. The amount of people who started to take interest in SUP foiling was getting bigger and bigger. That year there were still only 12 SUP Foilers and Annie Reickert remained the only female to cross the channel in that category. The writing on the wall how ever was clear: SUP Foiling was the new thing and SUP moved to Europe.

  1. Kai Lenny – 2:29:38
  2. Jeffrey Spencer – 2:37:44
  3. Clement Colmas – 2:38:36
  4. Titouan Galea – 2:52:31
  5. Bernd Roedinger – 3:07:21
  6. Zane Schweitzer – 3:07:26
  7. Shuri Arkai – 3:16:29
  8. Alexandre Bicrel – 3:19:00
  9. Annie Reickert – 3:20:22
  10. Marcus Tardrew – 3:21:19
  11. Tomoyasu Murabayahi – 3:22:55
  12. Takuji Araki – 4:07:02

In 2019 Jeffrey Spencer was the first to round the corner at China Wall and only lost to Kai Lenny due to a fall on the final stretch. The stories surrounding the M2O in a post pandemic world will all be about SUP Foiling and the brand new addition of Downwind Wingfoiling.

Molokai2Oahu legacy with Andrea Moller

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The birth of the Stand Up Magazin

As of right now I should be sitting in an air plane going back to Germany for the annual kick off of the SUP Season at the boot show in DĂĽsseldorf. That off course handsomely fell through thanks to another wave of covid, instead I am now taking advantage of the extra time and working on my next magazine researching the past of SUP and the cultural shift in the sport. By doing this I dug deep in my archives and came across some pictures that are marking the moment the SUP Magazine idea sparked.

It was January of 2010 at the ISPO in Munich. My good friend and business partner and I got the incredible opportunity to present our label “JUCKER HAWAI’I” to a broader audience. We were in the process of making shirts and selling Hawaiian Labels (other than ours) online in Europe. We had some connections in the sporting world and were able to produce some of the first SUP Boards as well as Skateboard Longboards, Balancetrainers and even had a Prototype of a Skatesurfer.

We were in one of the sporting exhibition halls standing on our big epoxy boards and held a paddle in our hand. People were looking at us like: “What the …. ?” are these guys doing. We were pretty much the only ones at the ISPO with the giant surfboards. That was when I met Eric Terrien for the 2nd time actually. (We met a few months before at an SUP exhibition in ZĂĽrich) See video.

This video is hilarious. A classic almost. Youtube in 2009 imagine you stared a serious channel back then.

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Eric and his friend Abel were showcasing SUP with the brand Nidecker and in one of the hall ways without an actual booth. As far as SUP goes that was pretty much it, I do vaguely remember a Jimmy Lewis tent in the freestyle hall of the ISPO, but this was pretty much it.

So we spent the next 4 days at the show with our boards. Most interest we were able to gain with our Balanceboards and our Skateboards, the SUPs earned mostly skepticism. This story off course would not be complete without mentioning a blonde lady from the Netherlands coming to our booth particularly interested in the SUP. She introduced her self as Anne-Marie and she told me the story of this race in Holland where people raced through 11 cities on the canals in Holland. She was planning to make this a big thing but instead of ice skating like they do it traditionally she wanted to do it with a SUP. She already completed a trial run and 2010 was going to be the big year. She was looking for sponsors.

For my partner and I we started to understand that our “JUCKER HAWAI’I” SUP endeavor would be a very difficult one. Particularly considering going up against companies like Naish and Starboard who have well developed distribution channels. Instead the idea was to produce a SUP Magazine in which we can promote our longboards and balance boards. With this idea an much gained knowledge I left Germany and went back to Maui. It turned out that Anne-Marie also lived on Maui and we met up just a bit later to tell her story on my newly created website.

You can read the story here.

No its been 12 years and sometimes I think I should be writing a book. That might need another 12 years first.


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FOIL GUIDE

As pulished in Issue #16 in 2019

The truth about foiling

Everybody wants foils and every SUP and windsurfing company has a foil range in their program. The whole thing developed so fast. I actualle wanted to leave the topic about foiling out of the magazine, but now I just couldn’t help it. SUP and Foil, I thought, are actually two different things, but then somehow not. One thing is for sure: Foiling is currently the number ONE topic of conversation. Everybody wants it, few do it and even fewer are really good, that’s why foiling is so damn sexy. So let’s take a closer look at the topic.

> A quick look at the history

In 2003, foiling was the subject of the surf documentary “Step into Liquid” for the first time. The film by Dana Brown (son of Bruce Brown, producer of Endless Summer) devotes a part of the film to Larid Hamilton and Dave Kalama, as tow foil at Jaws. At that time tow surfing was a big thing and just about to take off. As a curiosity it is shown how the boys go surfing with a foil board at Jaws. Dave explains that Maui is very windy and that you are always looking for something new.

Dave Kalama and Laird Hamilton: Foil history in the new millenium.
Photos ©ErikAeder

The conditions are often not very good, hence the inventive spirit of Dave and Laird. Mike Walze explains in the film how a windsurfing colleague brought an “Airchair” back to Maui from the US mainland and presented it to the group. They started towing behind a jet ski and as so often Laird took the next step, by removing the seat and screwing snowboard boots onto the board. The whole thing worked and everyone else wanted to try it out. Mike Walze in the movie: ” There are thousands of surfboard shapers around the globe and one of them makes a board where you sit on it. He doesn’t even know that we’ve stood on it.” The pictures that follow are as breathtaking as they are curious: Laird Hamilton and Dave Kalama surf a huge wave on their modified foil boards. Their arms outstretched and huge shoes screwed to the board. The wind is blowing like hell, but thanks to the foil you don’t notice the chop. The boys surf in complete silence over the water, which would otherwise be unsurfable. In the movie the potential is also mentioned that if you will ever surf one of the biggest waves ever, then on a foil board. The surfing world was astonished for a short time and then moved on. That was in 2003 and the development in surfing went a different way. The world was not ready for foiling. First something else had to happen.

SUP AS THE MIDWIFE FOR FOILING

The SUP helped the foil to break through. Foiling is primarily about getting enough speed with a board to take off. Actually, it’s obvious, because with an SUP you can get into any wave. A SUP is exactly the right device to take off with a foil.

I discussed the topic with Kai Lenny in my interview in the last issue. The development went very fast, Kai mounted a foil under a Race SUP and started to foil the legendary Maliko Downwind Run on Maui. He got better and better and learned that you don’t need a big board to foil. Before we knew it, Kai was out on the open sea with a foil. Eric Terrien from France showed very early on how to jump on a foil board in a running manner and pump in absolutely flat water. The new generation of Maui Watermen such as Kai Lenny, Connor Baxter and Zane Schweitzer quickly realized what you can do with it.

The possibilities were demonstrated, the trend was set and the SUP scene was delighted. And because most SUP brands also offer windsurfing and kiting, kite and windsurf foiling was (re-)activated immediately.

The whole thing immediately spilled over to Europe. In 2018 Foiling was presented for the first time at the boot show in DĂĽsseldorf. On Maui, where the whole SUP trend started, everyone is now foiling. The SUP surfspots are full of SUP Foilers. This is the short summary of a very fast development. Foil designs already existed and so it was no big deal that the foil spread like wildfire. The whole thing gained a foothold in less than three years.

Now everyone wants to foil, it’s the ultra-mega-trend, which is so sexy that we are dripping from our mouths. Foiling is sexy, foiling is special, foiling is expensive and foiling is extremely difficult to learn. In this sport you will definitely not find any cheap products to buy. Not everybody can join in and those who did have a long way behind them.

> Now the big question: Who are the new customers and athletes?

With reservation all who are looking for a new challenge.

One thing is certain and this is confirmed again and again from all sides: Foiling is the next level of a sport that you already master. In other words: If you have never been on an SUP, you cannot learn foiling. First you have to master the sport equipment without the wing and then you can put a foil under it.

For SUP Surfers:

First you have to be able to paddle and surf a wave perfectly and straight. Having a very good balance is essential.

For regular surfers:

You have to have a perfect pop-up and be able to put your feet in the right position immediately.

These are the minimal requirements.

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