Patrice Guenole interview

[waterman]

Eigenaar/shaper van Gong stand up paddle boards Patrice aan het woord over Sup:

 

Carles: Hi Patrice, thank you for talking to us. For all the readers that don’t know anything about you, I can start introducing you as the ambassador of Stand Up Paddle Surfing in Europe and the owner and shaper of GongSup . But please, can you start introducing yourself?.

 

Patrice: Thanks Carles. Let me explain why I am deeply in love with SUP. I love all watersports because it is one of the best way to share and enjoy nature. I did surfing and windsurfing competitions for a long time, both in the same time. I was paddleboarding around the islands at 15. I started kiteboarding just at the beginning of it. And I have been working on R&D for years on watersports. So for me SUP was just one more way to enjoy the ocean.

When I saw a photo of SUP, I built a paddle and a board and gone in the water for a try. It was for me just adding one more toy in my quiver and adding one huge potential to enjoy the ocean. I have spent my life on regular beaches, the ones where you are happy to have one good session in a month!!! In fact, I enjoy places that everybody enjoys, just a regular place to play. This is the reason why I choose to go on all the watersports, one for each kind of conditions. This very large quiver permits me to have fun 365 days a year. That was the goal and it made me very open minded to all kind of feelings. So in my quiver I had loads of boards. The interesting point was I was used to surf long boards, things around 12’ and more, huge volumes for poor days.

When I started SUP here, nobody has never seen a real one. The fact I was used to ride long boards made me very confident on the potential of the big boards we needed for SUP.
 
In 1997, back from Oahu, I shaped a 12’ to have more momentum on my surf in a certain kind of waves. This board was magic. And on this board I was used to wait stand up! Here it is, when I saw a photo of SUP, I trusted in it in a second.
 
After the first ride, I was so convinced that I called all my friends to try. They were ok so I decided to produce the first moulded SUP in the world to share it with my friends. We had some amazing days, and some shitty ones )) But by the end, we created a new community. It was like a network of friends, a very small club. 2 years after, we teached more than 5 000 guys personally with Kik. We had all to invent, all the moves, the gear, the spirit, the potentials… It was some very nice years.

Now SUP is everywhere and I am very very happy about that.

Note that I never did SUP for money. When I entered it, I was working for a company who didn’t care about it. SUP was just a new toy to enjoy. After the job, we were used to go for a ride by night, have some waves or a drink with friends far away in the dark. Very funny and good for the spirit. Going to SUP is a true passion path for me. It is like everything in my life sent me on this path. All the things I did during the last 3 decades gave me the right tools to trust, understand and enjoy the SUP. Life is very funny no;-)

I quite the big company is was working for 2 years ago. I bought GONG to them before leaving and created a new company to continue this story by myself. I built something smaller, closer to my customers, more direct. Doing the shapes, the R&D, the photos, the mails permit me to be very close to what customers need. My life is all around it. I wake up and go for a little ride, first on the GONGSUP forum, then on the water for 30 minutes. I come back to the warehouse to send the orders. I spend hours to shape and try new things. I go to the office to check the hundreds mails. I go for another 30 minutes ride. I spend the diner time with my family and I go back to the computer. And when I go sleeping, I think watersports. This is the life I have 365 days a year. This is a “SUPer” life

C: Which is the wealth of SUP in France?. We know that is very popular in Hawaii, and as Bill Babcock told us in a previous interview is incredibly popular in Hawaii and USA. I also mentioned that here in Spain when the surfing conditions are quite good, the ratio of SUPers versus prone surfers is about 1 to 12. Which is the situation in France?

P: I don’t really have numbers. I live in an island and here 90% of surfers have a SUP in their quiver. I don’t know where it is going on the mainland and I don’t really care about it. My concern is all around passion, spirit, performance, pleasure, friends, nature, water.

You know, I see everyday how many guys are visiting my website. Of course, numbers are impressive, growth to. But you know I have seen and heard lot of things since years. At the beginning people were spiting on SUP, some said that it was the AIDS of surfing!!! Some of these guys are now dealing SUP… This is all fake to me. Every year since 3 years I heard guys in the market saying that “this year will be THE SUP year!”. And of course it is not THE year. Just because SUP is growing step by step, one guy after the other. I can see that because I am here since the day 1.

And that’s the reason why all my job is to put people in the water. To do it, I share my passion, period!. I don’t buy advertisings. I don’t talk of SUP as a regular business. I don’t make a shape for sales. I live my passion with friends, every day, and I share on the web the pleasure we have. It is not about numbers. It is all about pleasure. Surfing, SUPing, kiteboarding, Paddling, Windsurfing,,, it is all about passion and water. Same goal, different tools.

C: What hooked you on SUP, and when was your first wave ride on a SUP board?.
 
P: Hey, if I say 07, some will say they were here in 05… )) No numbers is a peaceful attitude .

What hooked me? The glide!!! The challenge to stand up 100% of the session. The ideas that born at each session. The new moves. The community created as 1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1………….

C: Which are the best sellers of your big SUP board catalogue and which are the main markets?

P: People like long boards because it is versatile and efficient in 95% of sessions. My goal is to share so I prefer when people spend time in the board instead of beside it in the water;-) Performance doesn’t need small toys. It is all about pleasure.

C: I’m really stoked about SUP, and I think it’s specially well adapted for the mediterranean, since our wave quality and frequency is quite poor, and SUPing allows you to have fun on small waves. But apart from small waves, SUP boards have had a inmense evolution over the past two years, and now we have high performance boards below 8’ and even below 7’. What do you think of these boards?, and what do you think is the future of SUP surfing?

P: I say since years that a SUP must do the same size than a surfboard for the same program. On a surfboard, you can cheat because you are not stand up all the time. So you can use a very small board even if it is not the one you need without knowing it. Some guys have spent decades on too much small boards… It is a problem of communication. The star system and the pro things make people think that the have to enjoy like the stars do. But firstly we have to enjoy the ocean and the waves we have.

Anyway, I pushed a lot the 12’ NFA on GONG to make people very confident on long boards, because this is what 95% of people need to have on their quiver to enjoy the poor days. I spent 2 years surfing mostly the 12’ NFA to show what we can do on a very long surfboard, and it worked. People are not afraid when they look a 12’ SUP. Try to do it on a surfboard!!!.

I shape small boards since years. I shaped the 7’7 Nanogene during the year 2!. I am 100kg and 1.87m tall. I have some 5’11 SUP in my quiver since years! Of course it works really well!!!. But people were not ready for it and are still not. The proof is I have two shapes (hand made) on my price list, a 5’6 to 5’11 and a 6’0 to 6’6, both SUP of course, and nobody ordered one. Why? People are not ready.

If we don’t go step by step, we will loose people, loose confidence. This is very simple to understand: the guys who ride since a long time started SUP minimum 2 years after me and my friends. All the steps we have lived, they have to live them by themselves. Of course, if I show some photos of my 5’11 (my favourite) everyday on www.gongsup.com, people will start to admit it. But it is not the right way to do for me.

The biggest problem of 80% of guys in watersports is frustration. We are all frustrated day by day by the crazy photos, the huge airs, the amazing skinny board ect… I don’t want to frustrate people. I want to share with them. And this is very positive to them because when I launch a new product, it means that I am riding it since 2 years! Approved by l’Ours means something. It means hours and hours of ride. Not shaping on a computer and send it to a factory for production…

So future of SUP is 100% like surf: shortboards, eggs, minimal, longboards, big sticks, paddleboards… period!

C: With this high performance boards, arrives board professionalization, and at the same time, disappears that special feeling that you have when you approach a new sport, when you think you can do a lot of very different things, or different approaches. I mean, when I first approached SUPing, I was thinking of a big 12’ or 11’ as a minimum board capable of surfing small waves, lognboarding style, and at the same time to do some flat water cruising and even downwinds. Now it seems that as happened at any mature xtreme sport, you should have your small waves board, your big waves board, your recreational or flat water paddling board and your downwind/race board. Similarly with paddles. What do you think? Is the sport losing this kind of magic?. We’ll appreciate your SUP addict answer as well as your SUP manufacturer answer.

P: This must not be a problem. A surfer needs a quiver. That’s a universal rule. Loving boards and gear is a part of the passion.

The problem is to let people think that they have to renew their quiver each year to perform! This is 100% false. It is a wind or kite specialty…

But remember that the board you enjoyed is still working 50 years later if you take care of it. Remember that 80% of the performance is on the knowledge of your gear, on the fusion between you and your board, your paddle. If you change all you feelings each year, you create illusions. Performance is not something you can buy. Performance needs time, history, questions, love, hates…

Think to the planet! Buy one board for decades, keep it nice, add one when you really know the first one, etc etc etc… Step by step. If I had not sold all the boards I have surfed in my life, and if I still have all of them, I am sure that I would surf 50% better than I do.

As a professional SUP addict, my message is this one.

As a manufacturer, manage SUP as a fashion thing, try to make money as fast as possible, is the worst way to prove the love for SUP. SUP can not die. But some guys can kill the message. Some guys can kill the addiction. Some guys can change the customers attitude. Customers by now are asking lot of things. They are very excited. They talk with friends. They share on the beach. The gold is here! Not in the fashion. I don’t care to sale 1000 boards this year if I sell 100 in 2020. Of course, factories need to produce and some watersports are in a deep crisis. But does SUP have to pay for that? Is it not very fair.

We have to explain to people how to have fun, how to build feelings, how to choose their gear.

C: I also enjoy flat water paddling as a fitness exercise far more interesting than working at the gym, and SUP racing seems also very interesting. What kind of future do you expect for these especialties?. Do you expect board design to get more and more specialized?

P: It is exactly like surfing and paddleboarding. The future is wide open for fast SUP.

The positive thing is that paddling for a long time on a SUP is way less hard than on a paddleboard. And it is more and more true when you have a lower level. The shapes have made huge steps. Remember the first LD SUP I did for production, year 1!!! It was absolutely insane but it worked so nice.

Not is shape boards that are very fast but also very easy. Comfort is a huge part of performance.

C: And what about hybrid boards for SUP and windsurf? I’m starting to see interesting boards from different manufacturers.

P: Again, I was the first to trust on it. I launched 3 shapes with Inspiro years ago. Of course the potential is infinite. The most important thing to me is that windSUP reminds us that the windsurfing comes from surfing!!! For me as a professional windsurfer, this means a lot to my culture.

SUP is just the step that was missing between Surf and Windsurf, period!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks a lot Carles.

 

 

[flowmaster]

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