I am looking forward to 2015 for many reasons, two of which have to do with this site. Today it was announced that I am the Performance Director for Stellar Kayaks USA. For those of you who don’t know, I helped launch Stellar surfskis back in 2009 and worked for Stellar until August of 2013 when I left Stellar.
http://www.stellarkayaksusa.com/
During that time away from Stellar, I was able to review ten surf skis and add them to this site. These reviews furthered my knowledge of how many good performing skis are on the market these days. I could not have reviewed as many of these surfskis as I did if it were not for my good friends, Chris Laughlin at North Coast Kayaks and Mark McKenzie and Mark Smith of Elite Ocean Sports. I also want to thank Daryl Remmler of Think Kayaks and my buddies at Ocean Paddle Sport East for making it easy on me to get a ski from them. All these guys have been supportive along my journey and I know this will continue in my new role with Stellar. I look forward to working with these guys and many others to grow the surf ski community as we start 2015.
Mark and Mark of Elite Ocean Sports
Chris Chappell and Chris Laughlin at Narrow River Race
Jim,Steve, Mark, Joe
A huge thanks goes out to Chris and Leslie Chappell who keep this website humming along with their computer knowledge, technical web design skills, and valued advice on how to keep the 12,000 to 15,000 monthly visitors engaged in the site. Leslie can make it happen either on her laptop or you can see her at some of the local surf ski races. While many paddlers complain of their wives as the limiting factor on how many boats they can own, my wife Betsy is in a league all her own. She can tolerate a garage/basement full of boats while listening to me drone on about the nuances of skis or the benefits of having some great friends in the surf ski community. I also want to thank Greg Lesher for his contribution to the site with his humorous race articles and mega data base “Surfski America”.
Greg Lesher
This site had many other contributors including Dorian Wolters’2014 Molokai experience, Zack Handler’s video and summary of the US Surfski Championships and Beata’s summary of the US Surfski Championship. Also this year we had Joseph DiChiacchio keeping us informed about the many races in the South. Thanks to everyone who contributed this year because it takes time to put together an article, create computer code,research website security or take 200 pictures at a race.
Zach Handler at US Surfski Champs
Beata(3rd) and Dorian Wolter(11th) US Surfski Champs (photo MaryBeth)
Chris and Leslie Chappell, Team SurfskiRacing.com
Speaking of articles and pictures, I hope to make it to a few more races this year thanks to rejoining the small but highly effective USA Stellar Team made up of designers/owners Dave Thomas and Ed Hofmeister of Northfield Massachusetts and Deb Arenberg, Sales and Logistics Manager. Stellar Kayaks and Surfskis started out in 2009 and in just five years has flourished into a name brand kayak and surf ski company known for their quality build construction, the first ever pre preg carbon surfski, innovative hull designs, world wide distribution, financial support of many local and worldwide surf ski races and having 20 models of light weight boats ranging from K1’s to Surfskis to racing and recreational kayaks. My job as Performance Director will be to promote the high performance boats within the Stellar line up including the racing kayaks, K1’s, and of course the surf skis. I will be a busy guy between my full time job in pharmaceutical sales, surf ski training, and maintaining SurfskiRacing.com along with Chris, Leslie, and Greg and my new role with Stellar.
Dave Thomas and Reid Hyle at 2014 East Coast Surfski Champs
This site will get a face lift in a few weeks with a new and exciting look and feel, complete with an expanded calendar feature and more space for advertisements. It will also include a Stellar Page that will feature some of the Stellar postings. By having a Stellar page on this site it makes it easier for me to post content across various platforms and increases viewership which is a win for the site, advertisers and viewers alike. I will continue to post on SurfskiRacing.com with race summaries, reviews, advertisements, contributors articles, etc., just as I always have done. So yes, complete transparency as I have committed to in the past and will in the future. I hope you will continue to tune in with all these dynamic changes. In college I worked at a men’s clothing store, called Mullins. I remember Mr. Mullins telling me one day, “if you are not changing then you will become obsolete”. Sound advice. So thanks to everyone for tuning in, commenting, contributing or advertising with us. Happy New Year and see you in 2015!
Wesley at 2014 Blackburn Finish, Kurt K in background.
