Skate Paddling Is Real Exercise — UCLA Just Proved It
What a peer-reviewed UCLA study means for a new sport, the people who ride it, and anyone who wants to live healthier, longer
By Don Sandusky and Landy Cook
In Summer 2026, the exercise physiology lab at UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine published peer-reviewed research on the sport we call skate paddling — and the results put hard science behind something riders have felt in their bodies for years.
In a 20-minute session, riders reached roughly 12 METs of intensity — vigorous-intensity exercise, on par with Nordic skiing. They hit about 94% of their maximum heart rate, burned around 310 calories, and rated the experience 4.6 out of 5 for enjoyment. The researchers ran the entire study on SUPSKATE equipment.
We wanted to mark the moment with two things: an honest look at what the science says, and two personal perspectives — the person who built the sports gear, and one of the athletes who lives it.
What is skate paddling?
Skate paddling is a sport in which you stand on a longboard skateboard and use a long paddle, or pole, to propel yourself forward off the ground — no foot pushing required. The stroke engages nearly every major muscle group, from your feet and legs up through your core and shoulders down to your hands. It's a full-body, low-impact cardio workout that feels less like exercise and more like surfing on pavement.
Because the paddle does the pushing, skate paddling is unusually joint-friendly: you can ride hard for miles without ever planting a foot, which makes it accessible to people who find running or traditional skateboarding tough on their bodies.
A quick note on what to call it. You'll see this sport described a few different ways. We call it skate paddling. The UCLA researchers used the technical term skate poling. Some people know it as land paddling. They all describe the same activity — and SUPSKATE is the brand that builds the purpose-made gear behind it.
What the UCLA study found
The study measured the real physiological cost of skate paddling, and the numbers land it squarely in the category of serious exercise:
- ~12 METs of intensity — well above the threshold for vigorous physical activity, and comparable to cross-country (Nordic) skiing.
- ~94% of age-predicted maximum heart rate during the session.
- ~310 calories burned in a single 20-minute ride.
- 4.6 out of 5 on the enjoyment scale.
The researchers characterized skate paddling as a high-intensity, low-impact, whole-body activity — one that exceeds the physiological demands of jogging and conventional skateboarding while staying easy on the joints. Just as importantly, they flagged the rare pairing it produces: an activity that is both genuinely demanding and genuinely enjoyable.
You can read the full study here: the 2026 UCLA / JPES study on skate poling.
(One honest caveat: this was an exploratory study of 15 trained young adults in a single session. It measured how hard and how fun the activity is — not long-term health outcomes. That's where the next section comes in.)
Why this matters for living healthier, longer
Here's the bigger picture, and it's the reason this small study should interest anyone who cares about longevity.
The UCLA team measured intensity and enjoyment — not lifespan. But those measurements connect directly to one of the most consistent findings in modern medicine: cardiorespiratory fitness — your VO2 max — is among the single strongest predictors of how long and how well you live. A 2018 JAMA Network Open study of more than 122,000 adults found fitness inversely associated with mortality from every cause, with no observed upper limit to the benefit (Mandsager et al., 2018). The fitter you are, the longer you tend to live — at any age.
The way you build that fitness is regular vigorous exercise. And the reason most people never do is brutally simple: they don't enjoy it, so they quit. Adherence, not knowledge, is the thing that fails.
That's what makes the UCLA finding interesting beyond the numbers. Skate paddling scored as both vigorous and fun — and enjoyment is exactly what turns exercise into a lasting habit. A hard workout you actually look forward to is the rarest and most valuable kind there is. For a generation chasing health span, not just lifespan, "vigorous exercise that doesn't feel like a chore and won't wreck your joints" is close to a holy grail.
The creator's view — Don Sandusky
I'll just say it plainly: this is the best new paddle sport nobody's ever heard of.
For more than a decade, people called it a toy. I built it anyway — the boards, the poles, the stroke — because every time I stepped on the board, I knew it was something more. You don't spend ten years on a gimmick.
Skate paddling didn't come out of nowhere. It grew out of Hamboards — the long, surfy decks that earned a reputation as the King of all Longboards. I'd been shaping those boards for years to put the feeling of surfing on the street. Adding the paddle was the piece that turned a great ride into a whole sport.
What I love is that it gets people back out on a skateboard — having fun and feeling flow — without requiring superhuman fitness. It's the cool-dad and cool-mom sport. (No insult intended to everybody else.) And here's the funny part: the kids haven't even discovered it yet. It's always us kooky old people who come up with the coolest stuff.
The UCLA study put science where my gut has always been — but the data only confirms what riders already feel in their bodies. This sport isn't going anywhere. People who feel it get their stoke back, and once that happens, they don't stop.
The rider's view — Landy Cook
My favorite feeling with longboarding is the sense of flow you get when you start covering a lot of miles without really thinking about it. It doesn't feel like work or exercise. It just feels like fun in a way that other sports don't. There's something about propelling yourself forward using the skate pole and your core, without putting a foot on the ground — and at its best, it just feels like you're floating. To me, it is the epitome of the flow state.
Skate paddling is a sport where you stand on a longboard skateboard deck and use the pole to push yourself forward off the ground. It engages most of your large muscle groups, from your feet up through your hips to your shoulders and down to your hands. Once you feel comfortable, you can start to add pumping to the mix, and that brings even more muscles into the workout. It can be a very low-impact sport, and you don't need to use your legs to contact the ground at all — unless you want to.
I'm someone who's had more than my share of injuries over the last several years, and I really appreciate having multiple ways of staying in shape when one of my body parts fails me. With paddling, you can keep using your arms when your feet or legs are injured or fatigued. And when your shoulders are bothering you, you can primarily pump or push with your legs instead.
When you're out riding, you'll gather attention. People are just curious when they see somebody standing on a longboard with a skate pole in their hands. That's inevitable when you're doing something that looks so foreign to people, so you'll end up answering a lot of questions about skate paddling, for better or worse. Everyone who does this sport becomes a de facto ambassador. If you're a little self-conscious like I am, you'll quickly adapt — the benefits of spreading the stoke far outweigh the self-consciousness.
I really appreciated the UCLA study because their team was able to confirm what most of us who skate paddle already know intuitively: that it's an excellent and highly intensive aerobic exercise. It's low impact compared to sports like running, and it lets you work your aerobic system in a way that's both fun and challenging. Only recently I started using an armband heart rate monitor, and it confirmed something I'd suspected — I've been getting better exercise all along than my wrist-based monitor could ever verify. My heart rate climbs as much as it does when I'm running, at least when I'm going at a good clip. It's really cool to see the science catch up to the art of skate paddling — all of us who do it already appreciate how good it feels to work the whole body and get our heart rate into a zone that holds its own with any other highly aerobic activity. And for most of us, skate paddling is an awful lot more fun than other sports.
I think skate paddling is for anyone who wants to challenge themselves in a nontraditional way, with a sport that's both fun and nuanced. It's easy enough for anyone to step up on the board and have a go without any significant training. But developing your aerobic capacity, your own style, and your sense of flow can challenge you for years to come. For me, being able to record my sessions on video lets me express my creative side as well. So skate paddling is great for both newcomers jumping on the board for the first time and seasoned athletes testing their limits at higher speeds and higher intensities. I love it every single time I go out: I come back mentally energized and physically knackered, and I never have to psych myself up to ride, because it's just so naturally fun. I can offer no higher praise than that.
For me, I'm still recovering from the injuries I picked up over the last year, and I'm hoping to get back to endurance events like the Miami and Dutch Ultraskates once I have a few more healthy miles under my belt. Being off the board for a few months only made me more appreciative of how amazing this sport is.
How to get started
Skate paddling takes just two things: a board and a paddle. Here's the gear, built specifically for the sport:
If you're new to it. Start with an SUPSKATE Endurance 45 paddle skateboard and an entry-level SUPSKATE Telescoping Skate Paddle. The Endurance 45 is purpose-built for skate paddling, pushing, and pumping, and the telescoping paddle is the most portable, economical way in.
If you want to go the distance. Step up to the SUPSKATE Endurance 60 long-distance paddle skateboard — the closest match to the 60-inch board used in the UCLA study — paired with a performance paddle like the Custom High-Flex or the carbon Race Stiff-Flex.
If you want to the very best and latest gear for "bare dogs". Try the SUPSKATE FLOE 45 Paddle Kit — our lightest, latest-generation 45-inch option — paired with a performance paddle like the Mid Flex Street Sweeper.
For pure SUP paddlers Try the SUPSKATE Touring 74 — the closest match to the Hamboards Classic — paired with a performance paddle like the Mid Flex Street Sweeper.
Browse everything. See the full range of SUPSKATE skate paddles, purpose-built paddle boards, and all skate paddling gear in one place.
Step on, give it a go — and welcome to the sport.
Frequently asked questions
Is skate paddling a good workout? Yes. In peer-reviewed UCLA research, skate paddling registered roughly 12 METs — vigorous-intensity exercise, comparable to Nordic skiing — with riders reaching about 94% of max heart rate and burning around 310 calories in a 20-minute session.
Is skate paddling low impact? It is. Because you propel yourself with a paddle rather than by pushing off the ground with your foot, you can ride for miles without repetitive impact, making it far gentler on the joints than running. The UCLA team described it as a high-intensity, low-impact activity.
How many calories does skate paddling burn? In the UCLA study, trained riders burned about 310 calories in a single 20-minute session. Your own burn will vary with effort, pace, and body weight, but the intensity sits firmly in the vigorous range.
How is skate paddling different from regular skateboarding? Instead of kicking off the ground, you drive forward with a paddle and your core, engaging the whole body in a continuous aerobic rhythm. The UCLA researchers found it exceeds the physiological demands of conventional skateboarding.
Is it hard to learn? No. Most people can step on and ride within a single session. The sport is easy to start and deep to master — your aerobic capacity, style, and flow can keep developing for years.
What's the difference between skate paddling, skate poling, and land paddling? They all describe the same sport: riding a longboard and propelling yourself with a paddle. "Skate poling" is the academic term used in the UCLA study; "land paddling" is an older name; we call it skate paddling. SUPSKATE makes the gear.
About the authors
Don Sandusky, Ph.D. is the owner of Hamboards and founder of SUPSKATE and the “pied piper” and leading gear innovator of the skate paddling sport. An engineer and inventor, he has spent more than a decade designing the boards, the paddles, and building the community of the sport itself.
Landy Cook, M.D. is a retired pediatrician who lives on the eastern shore of Maryland. He spends his days hanging out with his family and his dog, and skate paddles whenever he possibly can. He considers himself a competitive age-group athlete — though he'll be the first to tell you that you're only ever competing with yourself.
The study, in full
Thomas, J., Kidwell, J. A., Young, T., Sahni, T., Roberts, C., Shatagopam, V., Hetherton, K., Yamamoto, T., & Dolezal, B. A. (2026). Longboard skate poling: Physiological and perceptual responses as an emerging recreational activity. Journal of Physical Education and Sport, 26(5), Art. 96, 952–959.
Read it here: https://www.efsupit.ro/images/stories/may2026/Art%2096.pdf
DOI: 10.7752/jpes.2026.05096
— Don & Landy