We are very excited to announce that SIC Maui have won the prestigious “Brand of the Year” award, and the SIC RS also won “Best Race Board” in the Gear of the Year awards. The success did not end there! International team riders Seychelle Webster came 2nd in the “Woman of the year” and super grom “Jade Howson” came 2nd in the “Grom of the year”.

SAN DIEGO, California – After more than six weeks of deliberations and intense evaluations we are pleased to announce the winners of the 2018 Supconnect Awards. After nominating 30 or so men, women, groms and blogs per category, and an abundance of brands and shops in the stand up paddle industry we’ve finally narrowed down the extremely talented pool of nominees to the final chosen winners.

With over 50,000 views and more than 13,000 interactions of the Awards it has been a very meticulous journey to get to this point. In following our criteria for choosing the winners (Ambassadorship, Involvement, Performance and Support), to help us decide the winners of these awards, we here at Supconnect go through an extremely rigorous process in selecting the winners. We consult and receive feedback from our advisory board, whose members are made up of those who are passionately involved in the sport of standup paddling and who have a unique take on the sport, we take into account the many thousands of interactions with the Awards from fans and consumers, we add in our own feedback from our editorial board and we’ve also had extensive feedback and contact with retailers in the industry. We’ve had hundreds of back and forth emails, personal phone calls and meetings in person at events, trade shows and demos to get the best feedback possible that we can on our nominees.

Here is what they had to say about the SIC RS:

Buzz and popularity by themselves are not enough to earn one of Supconnect’s awards. But sometimes, all the chatter around a product has real substance behind it. And here is where SIC Maui’s Rocket Ship, aka RS, has taken the world by storm. Tagged as an “All Water” Race Board, the RS introduces several variations of previous models in the SIC Maui line, but all in one crazy fast rocket ship. The squared tail offers plenty of stability on buoy turns and technical conditions; the deck has drainage holes to avoid the lower standing position from accumulating water; the lower deck lets the paddle stroke to engage with more power; and the combination of the bulbous nose, rocket, and rails all coalesce into one fast machine, rolling through bumpy rides and slicing through flatwater. Here, buzz and popularity are the byproducts of a truly extraordinary SUP race board, SIC Maui’s RS, Race Board of the Year in the Supconnect Awards 2018.