Redondo Beach resident and aquatic star Danny Ching won his second straight championship in a major event by sweeping the 5-mile Elite Battle and 10-mile Downwinder events at the Rainbow Sandals Gerry Lopez Battle of the Paddle Hawaii held recently off the coast of Waikiki.
Ching, 27, came off a record-breaking performance in April when he won the Steinlager Kaiwi Channel Solo OC1 (one-person canoe) World Championship to become the first non-Hawaiian paddler to win the 32-mile race from Molokai to Oahu.
Although Ching remains successful in sit-down competition, the former member of the U.S. Olympic Kayak team has shifted his focus to Stand Up Paddle (SUP). In January, he started 404 Paddlesurf, designing and testing stand up paddleboards. His new 12’ 6” board is expected to be released this summer.
Ching returned to Hawaii prepared to defend his SUP Distance title at the Battle of the Paddle on Sunday, June 13, but the Redondo Union High School (RUHS) alum first had to endure Saturday’s Elite race and its 19 buoy turns and two 75-yard beach sprints.
After nearly an hour-and-a-half of competition, Ching’s dash to the finish line gave him a time of one hour, 22 minutes and 42 seconds, a mere 13-second victory over Australian paddler Travis Grant, and $5,000 in prize money.
Veteran Hawaiian paddler Aaron Napoleon, 43, was third in 1:26:30 and Jamie Mitchell (Australia), the most dominant paddleboarder in the world, was fourth with a mark of 1:27:00.
The following day, Ching battled through fatigue to win the Distance race in 1 hour and 26 minutes. He admitted to being surprised after winning both races, which earned him $6,100 of the event’s $25,000 purse.
“I didn’t expect that at all,” Ching said. “I was hoping to win one of the days but luckily it panned out for me. I definitely felt fatigued (in the distance race). But once I got out into the surf I was able to build a bit of a gap. I was figuring that would hold them off at the end because if you raced (the Elite race) you were going to have a hard time making the final push the last two miles.”
Ching was introduced to the sport of paddling at an early age. His father, Al, founded the Redondo Beach-based Lanakila Outrigger Canoe Club in 1970, now the largest outrigger club in California.
Danny began racing at the age of 11 and later became a standout athlete at RUHS, earning MVP honors in soccer, water polo and swimming.
When he’s not training or competing, Ching coaches outrigger junior and men’s teams and in July will serve as a Los Angeles County lifeguard instructor in the Junior Guards program in El Segundo. He admits he has a lot on his plate with no aspiration to compete in the 2012 Olympic Games, despite having many friends on the team.
“I’m having too much fun traveling and competing in a variety of events,” Ching said. “Life is really good right now.” ER
