SUP 11 – City Tour

The Dutch province of Friesland (or “Fryslân” in the quaint local language) plays host to what is surely the most famous ultra of them all. The SUP11-City Tour aka the 11 Cities aka “Five days of Pain in the Fields of Friesland” is the very definition of bucket list event. It’s a pilgrimage that I believe every paddler needs to make at least once in their lifetime. It’s our Mecca, if you will.

The 11-City Tour is a five-day stage race where competitors race between five and eight hours each day through the rural farmland of the north-east Netherlands. But while the past few years have been dominated by the likes of the Hasulyo Brothers, we’ll see new challengers this year, at least on the men’s side, as Bruno, Daniel and the world’s best head to the woefully-timed ICF Worlds in Hungary. On the plus side, it’s actually shaping up to be the biggest 11 Cities ever in terms of total participation, and the fact the big names aren’t there is a blessing in disguise: it’ll allow us to mine a little deeper and find more of those interesting stories behind the scenes.

If you want to hear those stories, tune in daily for the 11 Cities Morning Show that I’ll be hosting (remotely from Australia just like last year). Speaking of stories: There are even a few paddlers who’ve signed up for the infamous “double” — paddling the non-stop on Saturday and Sunday before resting less than 72 hours and tackling the five-day tour. You’d definitely get to know the fields of Fryslân pretty well after that…

And in a random but quite fascinating piece of trivia: Not only is it one of the longest races in the world of stand up paddling, the 11 Cities has recently assumed the mantle of “longest-running race in the world” full stop. Don’t quote me on this, but I believe no race has been held every year for as long as the 11 Cities, which began in 2009 and has never missed a beat despite the immense hurdles of the past 18 months. The only current events that are older – the Molokai2Oahu SUP division (introduced in 2006) and the 2007-born Tahoe-Nalu race – were unfortunately cancelled last year.