Photos from Coastal Urge’s 1st Annual Waterman’s Challenge

Article by Peter Trow, photography by Tyler Hustrulid

“Challenge” was the key word in Coastal Urge’s first ever Waterman’s Challenge event this past weekend in Wrightsville Beach, NC. The grueling event consisted of a ten mile kiteboard race, followed by 50 yard sprint on the beach, straight to a two mile standup paddle with the first half going directly into three foot chop with a 20 knot head wind, another 50 yard sprint up the beach and back into the rough ocean for an exhausting 50 yard swim and finally finishing up with one last 25 yard sprint to the finish. Sound fun?

The race was designed to test the skills and endurance of the competitors and I can tell you first hand that it did a very good job of that. Most of the competitors are proficient at one sport at a time but put together and combined with the beach sprints and swim we were all pushed to our extreme limits and very happy to see the finish line.  The combined test of skill made for a fun yet taxing competition that I will definitely do again, however next time I’ll spend a few months training before.

On any day Peter Trow can be found chasing the wind and swell tow-in surfing, paddlesurfing, kitesurfing, foil surfing, or surfing his long board. Peter resides in the Central Coast of California and was the first pro kiteboarder from California when he started back in 1998. Before that Peter was a pro windsurfer, traveling the world to compete in big wave windsurfing contests.  You can see him in action on his Vimeo page.