Paddleboarding growing in popularity

Twelve years ago paddleboarding barely existed - now it makes up more than 15 per cent of all surfing in the country.

The figure comes from the country’s largest surfing survey - run by Surfing NZ - which saw nearly 2000 people respond to questions about what, how and when they like to surf.

This was the second national survey of its kind run by Surfing NZ, which ran a similar poll in 2005.

However, 12 years ago stand-up paddleboarding was in its infancy. Since then the surfing alternative has skyrocketed in popularity.

‘‘When we last did the survey there was a zero response from paddleboarders. This time around they’ve risen to 15 per cent,’’ Surfing NZ spokesperson Ben Kennings said.

Surfing NZ estimates that one in 27 people in New Zealand surf - roughly 145,000. And 1831 of those surfers responded. The survey covered questions from how people got into surfing, at what age, what and where they surf as well as any barriers they’ve faced.

Coromandel led the pack in terms of the regions New Zealanders have surfed in the last year, followed the Bay of Plenty, Auckland, Northland and Taranaki.

Over the course of their surfing lives most people had surfed in the Bay of Plenty, Coromandel, Waikato, Auckland, Northland and Taranaki, while much smaller numbers reported surfing in Canterbury, Dunedin or Southland.

Seventy per cent of of respondents said they rode shortboards and 24 per cent said longboards, while the next closest was bodyboards at just over two per cent. The 15 per cent of the total respondents who rode paddleboards were directed to a slightly different survey.

Forty-three per cent of people started surfing between the ages of 11-15 as opposed to the 28 per cent who got into it before they were ten. A small number started between 20 and 30 years old.

Kennings said the female response - 18 per cent of the 1,831 respondents - was a relatively low number, but wasn’t sure if that was to do with their targeting of the survey.

‘‘Overall the number of people who responded was a little lower than we hoped, we had about 2000 last time, but a useful sample is about 700,’’ he said.

‘‘We had it live for about three weeks but perhaps if we extended that time we would have reached our goal of 2500.

‘‘Understanding which regions have a strong surfing presence determines where we hold events, where we concentrate learn-to-surf programmes and other developments to the surfing community.’’