Taking a break from the in depth book reports and integrated philosophy analyses to post some coach vids with voice overs. The first one is me riding three of the new CSC x Barahona Shapes boards we just got in. The pink and green is 8’6” x 23” x 3” (the new pink stripe/pink cloud ), the purple and white is 8’2” x 22.75” x 3”, and the red is 9’ x 22.75” x 3”. Clearly 3” is my favorite thickness on these kinds of boards. This video features tons of slo mos so that you can break down take offs, stances, and how to use the tail to control a larger surfboard. Always remember that the tail is the control center of the board. If you do not have your foot over the tail of the board you cannot effectively turn it. Notice how when I’m trimming my stance is either all the way tall and alternatively narrow or wide or completely crouched with my butt near my heels. I have been noticing that people are getting confused between the low crouch frontside vs backside. They’re different! Take notice in the vids and in pictures below. You want to practice these postures at home.
Low rail grab crouch backside. Note knee is tucked under back arm and butt is nearly on the heels. Front hand is up off of the board pointing down the line.
Frontside low turn. Notice, unlike backside, no hands on rails. Knees are a little more parallel, butt faces down towards board, back foot is planted on board, hands are to the sides of my body, not blocking my off in front of my body.
All of the kinds of stances can be performed on the back, middle, or front of the surfboard, but you just have to be intentional about which part of the board and why. When we do anything towards the back of the board it’s so that we can better control the board, either to turn or to stall. When we’re in the middle it’s for stability and trim and to moderate speed. We got to the front to release more pressure off the fin, which creates more speed down the line but becomes unstable if the wave is not sufficiently steep enough to hold us up. In general we walk forward when the wall is steeper or when we perceive it will at the very least stay steep and open enough for us to walk forward. Then the trick is knowing when to walk back again! Usually well before the wave closes out is a good bet.
Beginning surfers have a tendency to pop up in one place and stay there. When they do walk they tend to walk forward for speed, which is kind of right intuitively, but usually equates in a nose dive. To know where to stand on the board you need to be reading the wave correctly from the takeoff. You should have an idea of what kind of wave it will be — mushy, fast, closeout, peeler — long before you even paddle for it. There is no way to guarantee your guess will be correct every time — waves do change on us — but at the very least you can start to plan out your ride. You will notice there are a lot of waves where I cut right to go left — a fading take off — this is because I’ve judged that the wave is small and peeling and that I’ll get more out of the ride if I start with a turn from behind the peak.
The second vid is the almost full session of what was leftover of the Isaias swell. It’s filmed by Mitch Blummer and edited by me. I’m riding a 5’4” Lost Roundnose Retro Fish with keels. I went for a lot of waves because I was frothing, but only about 15% of my rides pan out well. I mistimed a lot of sections and just had a lot waves that had no shoulder left in them for me. But I did get a few nice turns in on a couple of the waves. I feel that all the yoga I am doing is helping me surf faster and more flexibly than ever. I could use to rotate my upper body even more through my carves. As my shoulders and hips start to open up more, I see this happening. Also, it’s a bit easier when there’s more wall to work with, which was only the case with a few waves in this session. I look forward to better hurricane swells that do not land on the coasts.
Some people are ready to do cut backs and have been asking me where to do them. I think that in both of these videos you can get a sense of where and how to do them. You want to see the area where you’re going to place the cutback from the start of the ride. You look down the line and see a clear clean face with a taper. The idea is to either come around from the whitewater, using its energy to thrust you into that open spot where you then place your turn with your back foot and redirect back to the whitewater, or you ride out far in front of the taper and use your speed and pressure on the tail to veer the board back to the power source. The two things that remain constant: you need to see that there is enough of a shoulder for you to work with ahead of time, and you need to make sure your back foot is over the tail as you go into your turn.
Setting up the turn from behind the white water. I see the open face ahead of me and I’ll use the force of the white water to send me into it.
Pressing through both toes and feet evenly, eyes still on area ahead.
Move weight onto back foot so that I can press through the tail to pivot back to the power source.
Open and rotate upper body either ahead of or inline with legs and feet — if my fore arm was higher and my gaze was higher I probably could have achieved a tighter arc — and press through the back foot. If you see my cheeks are puffed up because I’m exhaling as I do this.
Rotating hips and unweighting back foot to flow through the end of the turn.
As soon as I’m back to the whitewater my eyes go back to the wave ahead. Crouched position keeps the whitewater from taking me by surprise or knocking me off my board.
As with shortboard wave, I see the shoulder in front of me.
Step back foot back to tail when I’m on the shoulder.
Press down and through the tail with my back foot.
Unweight tail by stepping slightly forward when I’m done with the turn.
These screen grab sequences illustrate that some of the principles for cutting back and turning are the same on a shortboard and a long board. All boards will draw different arcs and different waves will allow for different angles and variation of attack. I am a firm believer that one should be able to do such moves on a longer board before one tries on a shorter one. The longer board makes more of its own speed and is more stable, so it will give you a lot of grace and good timing that you can then apply to a shorter board down the road. Pumping on a shorter board is sometimes necessary to generate more speed but it is ideal to be able to simply flow from turn to turn. If you do not know how to carry and manage speed then it will be hard to ever achieve this in your surfing. Best way to learn to carry and manage speed is to ride a board that creates its own. And of course to learn how to enter the wave with as much glide and control and intention as possible.