The Cosmic Experience, Bali – The 1st Longboard SUP Surf Only Competition!

Can you tell us about yourself? And the famous Longboard SUP revolution?

I’ve surfed for over 55 years on both short and longboards.  I started SUP surfing about 15 years ago. The Longboard SUP Revolution (LSR) was born out of my love for the longboard SUP style! For me longboard SUP style surfing has it all with a balance of performance and traditional manoeuvres, which is also the judging criteria that was established exclusively for the longboard SUP category. The fact that the category is so inclusive of all ages and skill levels has led to the surge in category’s increasing popularity. Back in the late 60’s there was a Shortboard Revolution when surfboards design changed and surfers stopped riding longboards and started riding shorter boards. The LSR is the opposite of this, we have gone from riding short SUP boards to longboard SUPs and in doing so a longboard SUP revolution evolved.

The LSR facebook group started about 6 years ago to promote the establishment of a longboard SUP style of surfing category and in doing so, get that category included in all SUP surfing events held from local SUP clubs up to State and National Titles in Australia. The category has become so popular in Australia that a longboard SUP community has been established with a number of events now exclusively longboard SUP events. The movement is now being established worldwide with the APP World Tour committing to run 3 longboard SUP events in 2023. We hope to get an APP World Tour event in Australia, possibly even next year.

Back to the 2023 Cosmic Experience comp, what is the format?