We’re excited to bring SUP 5.0 to Koh Samui, and today was our inaugural 5km time trial. We started at Cheong Mon beach, just in front of Crystal Restaurant, and paddled north to Tongson Bay (in the north east of the island). We weren’t sure of the distance, but found that the beach in front of the Melati Resort was a perfect 2.5km turning point. The course started out fairly glassy and the wind was forecast to be 8 knots W. It became a little choppy as we turned the corner into Tongson Bay. The local fisherman was probably surprised to see us at that point.
The return leg was more fun with the breeze behind our shoulder and we caught a few runners around the Tongson Bay southern headland. It was nice to get back onto the glassy conditions and cruise past the moored yachts back onto Cheong Mon beach. After a quick swim, we headed over to Crystal, our favourite beach front restaurant, for fresh coconuts and a cooked breakfast.
Today’s results was 44:34 for Ian, and 51:42 for Tammy. This compares to our last SUP 5.0 in Australia, where our times were around 42 and 49 minutes. It’s completely different conditions up here, today it was 29C at 8am, and we hit some wind and also some chop at the Tongson Bay headland.
Find out more about the SUP 5.0 Time Trials here. Or join us next Sunday morning…
Sounds like a beautiful route, lots of changing scenery, wind and ocean conditions to keep it interesting. I never make the time to paddle that far normally, reckon I’ll have to pace out our own SUP 5.0 here in Pattaya. Thanks!
Yeh, it’s a beautiful spot. Although ideally SUP 5.0 should be on flatwater (so it’s a consistent time trial), so we may move to more protected waters next Sunday.