The seventh annual Cold Stroke Classic’s elite course involved seven strenuous miles of paddleboarding through Wrightsville Beach’s waterways. Yet it was the final yards of the race that decided the outcome.
The riveting hour and a half race began the morning of Jan. 17 with 55 competitors standing on their boards in Banks Channel, many wrapped in layers of clothing that, while useful in protecting against the cold northeast breeze, would provide little relief should they fall into the icy water.
Not long after the start of the race, five or six competitors distanced themselves from the others, stroking in single file. As they passed through the Intracoastal Waterway and into Lees Cut to complete the first of two laps around Harbor Island, Jeremy Whitted from Charleston, S.C. had the lead.
Chris Norman, Kevin Rhodes and Ron Gossard drafted in his wake. The lead was then traded back and forth, with each racer at some point bearing the brunt of the wind and current. Kevin Rhodes from Wrightsville Beach was in front heading into Motts Channel to begin the second lap.
By then another competitor had joined the pack. Corey Taylor, also from Charleston, said he planned to make his bid for the lead later.
“You just keep your pace, and then you hopefully just pump it through and get to them at the last minute,” he said. “Drink some water and go for it, and hope you don’t die out before it ends.”
On top of the currents and eddies in the waterway, the paddlers faced the additional challenge of an outgoing tide that was almost dead low as the racers neared the finish.
“It was shallow right there through Lees Cut, your fins are dragging,” Taylor said.
As the competitors battled through Banks Channel towards the finish line at the Blockade Runner Beach Resort, Whitted and Taylor pulled in front. They paddled to the beach and ripped off their leashes. Although they leapt from their boards in unison, Whitted stumbled in the shallow water. Taylor raced past him up the beach and under the finish line in a final time of 1:24:40.
Seconds later the other members of the lead pack, Rhodes and Justin Schaay from Charleston, also finished. Despite the cold and the lure of a post-race lunch inside the Blockade Runner, the competitors stood around, laughing and congratulating each other.
While that sort of camaraderie is usually evident within the paddleboard community, Taylor said work schedules make it difficult for them to train together frequently. Race weekends, therefore, provide an opportunity to catch up.
“It makes it fun to come up here and compete with everybody who’s so close,” he said. “And out there, we’re hollerin’, encouraging each other, it’s part of the fun of it.”
The event also included a 3.5-mile recreational course, which drew 47 competitors. Race director and co-founder of Coastal Urge Jeoffrey Nathan said proceeds from the event benefitted the Community Boys & Girls Club of Wilmington.
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