#18 SUP - Training on the water

Training on the water - SUP as a form of exercise

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Obstacles and benefits of exercising on water

When doing SUP , it is inevitable to be in or on water. People often have mixed feelings about water, some love it while others find it unpleasant. This also applies when SUPing, but in what way is water an obstacle when doing SUP? Water, just like high altitudes, is a potentially dangerous environment for humans. This involves risks. It also means that we are more alert when we are in these environments, which means that we become more focused and our mindfulness increases. It also means that once we are doing an activity on or around water, the effect of what we are training is much greater because we activate more muscles to prepare ourselves for potential danger.

Increased effect of training on water

The effect of training on water being better than on land is mainly due to the fact that we sharpen ourselves because it is a more unsafe element. The water environment makes us sharpen ourselves and makes us more prepared for something that could happen. If we then also provoke the balance on the water, there is not a fiber in the body that is not activated because that is the worst thing the brain can think of in the first step. That is why SUP is so fantastic because it provokes us in a way that we very rarely get. When I realized this, it became a perfect tool for behavioral analysis.

Behavioral analysis of water exercise

When you do an analysis on a person who stands on a SUP board for the first time, you see which protective reflexes are activated and why they are activated. When we are then exposed to this and gradually begin to feel that we are gaining more and more control over it, that is when we grow as people. That is when the personal development takes place that we can take with us even when we get off the SUP and move on to another activity on land.

Is it gentler to paddle SUP than to train on land?

When paddling SUP, there is no shock load. The water is shaped so that it is always a smooth movement. The board itself makes the water give way and it becomes almost impossible to overload the body. Protective reflexes are a reflex-controlled behavior to protect the body in different situations, it is caused by the situation itself and nothing we control. With the help of SUP, we find so many ways that we can actually develop our performance or our movement ability or our joint stability because it is so direct. But in an extremely gentle way compared to, for example, running, which specifically affects certain parts of the body, SUP affects the entire body positively. Even if you think about being overweight, paddling SUP is minimally stressful. It is less tiring than walking, for example. It is a good form of exercise while being gentle on the entire body.

Low-intensity or high-intensity training?

The good thing about SUP is that it can be low-intensity but also high-intensity. We sometimes work with SUP as strength training, then we isolate the paddle strokes in different steps, sometimes we do low-intensity and a little longer distance, sometimes we do intervals and do between buoys. Learning an activity means that you get a larger range in your training, which gives more in return. Then you don't just need SUP, although I think it can be a good complement for everyone. And then it's also a lot of fun. After SUP, you always feel stronger, more energetic and everything just feels better in your body. Other training often feels worse after. You get tired and stiff and so on. SUP can be done quickly, easily and effectively. SUP is such a good balanced training. It really feels good in your back and in your whole body.

Overcoming discomfort through water exercise

One of the biggest positive effects of training on water is that you practice overcoming discomfort. It is programmed into us to be worried about things that could pose a danger. Humans do not have a system for different situations or environments, instead they activate one and the same system in many different situations. This means that if we learn to deal with a new environment that we are not completely comfortable in, we will carry that effect with us in other environments. If you are used to surfing in different contexts, for example, you will also be used to other similar environments and conditions. But what we really need to think about is: what is the value in actually working with this discomfort? So what do we gain more than just getting better at paddling? If you start looking at it more closely, you will soon see that if we learn to deal with this discomfort, we will also experience this in a completely different way and it becomes more and more addictive. Part of human development is to constantly learn new things, and learning new things means, for example, dealing with new environments and new situations. Overcoming physical anxiety is the same as overcoming mental anxiety. So daring to go out on the water and paddle SUP can have the effect that you will soon also dare to stand up and speak in front of people.