Conclusion to Board Handling
Regardless of whether you are on land or in the water, taking care of your board will lengthen its life span and yours. Knowing how…
Surfboard handling catagory
Regardless of whether you are on land or in the water, taking care of your board will lengthen its life span and yours. Knowing how…
Surfboards are large, fragile, and expensive, so it is important to know how to handle your surfboard both in and out of the water. Knowing…
Knowing how to control your board in the water will give you confidence to catch waves and avoid other people. It will also help you…
Knowing how to control your board in the water will give you confidence to catch waves and avoid other people. It will also help you get back out to the line up after catching a wave. Getting stuck in the white water, or impact zone can be terribly frustrating, knowing how to do that makes a world of a difference.
Sitting Up on Your Board
Sitting on your board acts as a resting position and gives you a better vantage point to identify waves. When you are sitting on your board, make sure that you are sitting towards the back of the board; almost as if you are leaning on the tail of the surfboard. This will help with a few things:
The fins create a lot of drag when you turn the surfboard, so if you engage them, it makes it much easier to pivot the board. It is the same principle as turning the surfboard when standing. Putting more back foot pressure on the board makes it much easier to turn.
Transition Lying Down to Sitting
Being quick and efficient on the board can mean the difference between catching and missing a wave. It can also be the difference between catching 1 wave and catching 10 waves in a session. It’s important to be comfortable and efficient with your movements to save energy and give yourself enough time to react to a wave.
How to Transition Lying Down to Sitting Up
Sitting Up to Lying Down
Turning the Board
You can turn a surfboard while sitting up or lying down. The concept is similar to a kayak or a canoe, when you want to turn to the left, you have to push and pull to the right, and when you want to go to the right you need to push and pull to the left.
Turning the Board While Lying Down
Turning the Board While Sitting up
Off Board Scenarios
In surfing, you will often find yourself in the impact zone. The impact zone is the white turbulent area where water is aerated from the impact of a wave breaking. If you know how to control your board in this situation, you will conserve energy and save time for catching more waves.
After you catch a wave, one of two things will happen. You will either fall off your board or dismount intentionally. Either way, you will end up in this impact zone area and have to navigate it to get back into the line up. As you are heading back out there are a few techniques to help you get there:
Turtle Roll
Introduction
The turtle roll is a technique to help you deal with incoming waves and help you get out of the impact zone and back into the line up after a wipe out or when paddling out. The movement requires you to roll over, so that you are upside down underwater with your board above you which helps you avoid most of the power that the wave exerts. Your board will rest on the surface while you pull the nose down towards you.
The broken wave or turbulent white water will wash over the top of the board and then you will have to roll back over onto the board again and continue paddling. You may have to repeat this multiple times in order to get back to the lineup.
How to Turtle Roll
Now you will be lying next to your board, it's important to be quick getting back on your board but also making sure that you are in the best position for paddling.
It’s much easier to get onto the surfboard from the back than it is from the front. Be careful of being too far back on your board when you start paddling again. You will waste a lot of energy and struggle to get out of the impact zone because you won't be covering much distance when you are paddling, the most common mistake is that surfers tend to end up too far back on the board. As they start paddling they create a lot of drag which makes it much harder to get out of the impact zone. Make sure that you take a little more time to set your position on the surfboard before you start paddling again.
Push Through
Introduction
As with the turtle roll, the push through is a movement that helps you get out of the impact zone and into the line up. This method is easier than the turtle roll, but is used for much smaller waves. The general rule of thumb is that if you cannot see over the wave when you push yourself up then you shouldn’t be doing this method and should rather turtle roll instead. When in doubt, do the turtle roll.
This method requires you to build up a bit of momentum before you initiate the movement, this will help you carry your momentum through the wave as the wave moves in the opposite direction.
How to Push Through
Adding a bit of pressure on the tail to help lift the nose out of the water really helps in this situation.
Conclusion to Push Through and Turtle Roll
When in doubt, always turtle roll. It’s very important to make sure that your nose is facing directly to the wave. If it's even slightly off then it will be hard to hold onto the board as the board offers more surface area to be caught by the power source of the wave. Being in the impact zone can be frustrating and tiring, remember to breathe, stay calm, be patient, and really pay attention to your position on the board when paddling.
Other Scenarios
You may find yourself in a situation where there is not time to get back onto your board to either turtle roll or push through the wave. We encourage you to keep as much control over your board as possible. Never simply let go of your board. This is for a couple of reasons:
Keeping control of your board is good courtesy to yourself and other people around you. There are a few techniques to help you do that:
Pin Drop
In the case that the tail of the surfboard is nearest to you, you can grab onto the swivel that connects to the rail saver and pin drop underneath the wave. This way, your board will stay close to you. This saves the person behind you from getting hurt and also reduces your time in the impact zone, because you can get back on your board quicker.
Superman
In the case that the nose of the board is closest to you, and you have no time to get back onto the board before the wave breaks on you. Grab onto the front of the surfboard and tuck the nose underneath your arm. Hold onto the board with one hand and, as if you are superman, push your other hand out into the wave. This way you keep control over your board.
DON'TS
A few things you should avoid at all costs:
Conclusion
No one is perfect, everyone makes mistakes. From time to time, you will find yourself in a position where you simply cannot keep control over your board. It’s okay, don’t feel guilty as long as you do the best you can to keep control over the board. If you do find yourself in a scenario where you have to ditch your board, then at least make sure there is no one around you so that you don’t hurt other people.
Lastly, it is important to put yourself in the safest place possible when in the impact zone. Always avoid paddling behind people when paddling back out, don’t leave your safety in the hands of someone else.
There was a problem reporting this post.
Please confirm you want to block this member.
You will no longer be able to:
Please note: This action will also remove this member from your connections and send a report to the site admin. Please allow a few minutes for this process to complete.