Inflatable Racing Paddle Boards: Tower Xplorer
Includes a 14' by 32" by 8" inflatable SUP, a high-end Tower branded diamond grooved deck pad, a standard longboard fin box with a removable center fin, a hand hold strap, a roll-up carrying strap, a towing ring on the nose, and a leash attachment ring on the tail.
Inflatable Racing Paddle Boards: A New Frontier in Inflatable SUPs
It will shock you how fast the 14' Tower Xplorer inflatable racing paddle board is. At 8" thick, it will also shock you how rigid it is. One of the major advantages of an inflatable racing paddle board of this size is that it allows you to do many different activities on the iSUP. Unlike our other inflatable paddleboards, the Xplorer has ample room to fit multiple people. Bring your kids, your significant other, or even your dog along for the SUP adventure. The Xplorer iSUP can also fit a cooler, several backpacks, and is the perfect fishing paddleboard.
Traditional hard board unlimited racing class SUPs are the fastest boards on the market. At 14' or longer, and with many over 7.5 inches thick, they also present a massive storage and transportation problem. For speed and glide, the longer the better, but it's a bitter tradeoff. You need an oversized room or garage to store them, and you've got to crate them for shipping (at a cost of $1000s per shipment). This is largely why more manageable 12'6" length hard boards have become the standard racing class size, but really they're still monsters to transport.
However, when you go with an inflatable, the length is largely irrelevant for storage and transportation as you just roll them up and go. We figured the longer the better, and we were right on the money. Once we tested the boards, we were blown away at the speed. It's the fastest board in our entire line-up... and if fits in a duffel bag when rolled up.
Amazing Rigidity
The Tower inflatable racing paddleboard was built for optimal performance. Due to its extreme rigidity and streamlined design it is one of the top stand up paddle boards on the market.
The Tower Xplorer Inflatable SUP is made from extremely rugged materials like those you would find on the highly regarded Zodiac boats and extreme river rafts. The stiff rigidity in the Xplorer is created by thousands of vertically oriented strands of identical length that connect the top deck to the bottom. When inflated, they form a structure that has the rigidity of a piece of plywood, and the thicker you go the exponentially more rigid it gets. Because of this rigidity, this inflatable racing paddle board is capable of going as fast as a traditional paddle boards. The Tower Xplorer is an unparalleled 8" thick. You'll be amazed. We have tested this inflatable racing paddle board with people over 300lbs and the board does not falter at all.
A Viable EPS/Epoxy Board Alternative - We're not kidding!
Traditionally, inflatable SUPs were only a consideration for traveling - store one in the cuddy cabin on your yacht, take it with you on the plane, or haul it into that secret mountain lake or river and you can stand up paddle board in the farthest corners of the earth. With the combination of speed and rigidity of the Tower Xplorer, an inflatable SUP is hard to beat on flatwater with anything less than a full-fledged racing hard board... and don't be surprised if it outperforms a few of those.
Benefits of an Inflatable SUP over an EPS/Epoxy board
- Easier to store - When rolled up, it's 1 foot in diameter and 37" wide.
- Indestructible - Never worry again about dings and board cracks. I've literally thrown these things off a 2nd story deck and I frequently set it down anywhere (gravel, a parking lot, even on cement stairs).
- Easier to transport - No need for roof racks. About the size of a rolled sleeping bag, it easily fits in any car or boat, and can even be strapped onto a bicycle or motorcycle. You can take it on a plane.
- Softer - You can literally play bumper boats with these. Kids can jump from one board to the other like they're jumping on an inner tube. You won't get knocked out in the waves either.
- Easy on the feet - While very rigid, the air does cushion your feet a lot more than a hard board, no matter how good the deck pad is.
- Less expensive - Which also makes it a great idea as a second board for travel or guests.