Surfing Waves

Hi all,

I have a 7 foot Superfish and am having issues popping up on it and was fine before on some 8 foot boards and thought this board would be a good transition board. Do you think this board would be significantly harder to pop up on or should I go back on the 8 footer for a while and come back to this board later. I'm trying to figure out if this is just a learning curve issue or if the board is the problem. It's really wide and thick so not really an actual shortboard.

I'll do different things but ultimately im having difficulties getting my front foot forward and underneath me quick enough and I'll go to my knee etc... I think the larger board allowed me to have room for error in the pop up but this board needs more precision and that is part of the problem. Any opinions about whether I should continue with this board until I get over this learning bump in the road or move to a different board? And will i eventually get over this and is this a normal problem for more advanced beginner surfers when they go to a new board?

If you persist you will get it eventually. Advanced surfers would have much less problem switching boards so what you are experiencing is a common beginner problem. Practice popping up at home

erinmck wrote: I think the larger board allowed me to have room for error in the pop up but this board needs more precision and that is part of the problem

This is the heart of the issue - your pop up isn't 'up to scratch' and the longer board allowed more tolerance and leeway; the shorter board doesn't...

But the pop up is just a matter of practice. Read around this forum (or others) about possible technique errors. For example, often your hands are too far forward. Or you are using your toes on an 8ft but cant do it on a 7ft. Figure out what needs to change.

Then try it on land/at home, spend a session just doing pop ups in white water (you can get 20-30 pop ups in an hour or until exhausted).

90% of popping up is the same on every board regardless of length - its usually just foot placement at the end that differs. So chances are its a technique issue and you can fix that with a bit of thought and practice.

Good luck!

Thanks for the reply! That is exactly what I am telling myself just to persist, and like anything, it will come with time and effort. Just want to make sure im not out of line with thinking that. My feeling is that it is a good thing im on a slightly less forgiving board because it is making me do it right. Its somewhat frustrating being able to pop up easily in the past and now going through this learning curve at the moment, but im having fun in the meantime And i will definitely go through the forum and try and tweak my technique

If you go to your knees, you are not a advance beginner. You are not even a intermediate beginner. You are a beginner and should not be going shorter until you can catch waves cleanly and bottom turn. For what ever reason you bought it for ( want to turn, want to duck dive, blah blah ), you own it now. You made your bed , now sleep in it. You were having fun on your 125cc MX, and went out and bought a 250cc. And now it's harder than you thought. Well, at least you didn't buy a 6'2" Firewire or Al Merrick ( or a 500cc 2-stroke mx ).

How regularly do you go surfing Erin? I know you've been learning for 5 years haven't you but how often do you get to go? Twice a year? Once a month? Once a week?

When I started I did a wkend in Cornwall once a year and told people I loved going surfing!

It's going to be great for you if you go more regularly try and relax and feel the waves, feel the point where you know it's right to begin your pop up. There's a brilliant 'surf simply' video about finding spot X..watch it but listen carefully. You actually should be missing a lot of the waves you paddle for at the start if you're doing it right.

Congratulations on your lovely new board! There's nothing like the feeling but if you want to progress you are going to need to learn what the problem is on an easier board first, then come back to this one.

So just to clarify, how many times have you been surfing in the past month and can you count on one hand the times you've been in the last year?

I have been surfing at least 5 times this month and cannot recall how many times I have gone this year, but just recently this month have started going at least once a week. Just to clarify, I will progress past this point faster if I go back on the longer board (8 foot foamie) and can keep this board for when I get the pop up down rock solid? And yes I am super excited about the new board!!! I just want to make sure I do what is best for my surfing progression

If you do the wrong thing over and over again you won't learn quicker. So you have to be doing the right thing and not developing bad habits. If you are paddling and popping up correctly, the quickest way to learn to ride that board is to ride it. However if you become frustrated and quit then that isn't faster. So if you had someone to watch you and evaluate what you are doing to make sure you are doing it right that might help your progression or if you are really athletic and motivated watching youtubes and reading up about it might suffice.

Also the more often you surf the better to make the jump to a shorter board.

Yes, I do have an instructor and he is very good and tells me what I am doing wrong with my pop up so I do have the feedback. i am just still struggling to get the pop up so thought it might be good to get a couple lessons on the longer board so I can perfect it, then move back to the smaller 7 foot board. Would you reccomend that I stay on the 7 foot and just keep up the work on my current board or go back to a larger one to perfect the pop up and then move back to the 7 foot once it feels more solid?

I don't know as much as the great gurus of thus site but get your surfing down pat first with your instructor on the bigger board (or as Lloyd suggested to you, a better instructor!!) Then when you can pop up, bottom turn fluidly, catch and ride the face of green waves competently without help reward yourself by moving to your new board. Based on what you've said I personally believe it's too much for you at the moment but I've been wrong before!

The thing is to properly enjoy that new board, you'd first need to be able to ride lots of waves unaided, in my modest opinion you should enjoy the journey, to do that I think you should work on all the things your instructor says and then when you know you are ready, and you will kinda know, pick up your new stick again. But we can't see you and your instructor can. Listen to him, ask him if he thinks you should stick with the new board or not.

For your consideration I had no lessons the first few times I tried surfing (a girl just gave me a few tips ) then I realized I needed proper help and the next handful of times I went I had lessons, these were great! Then I practiced all I'd been taught for ages and ages. Then I started to hoover up EVERYTHING I could on YouTube and sites like this and kept practising, then recently I had another lesson and now I'm back to practising that and practically living on this site reading EVERYTHING again

A mantra I heard that I like is: " try - fail, try - fail, try - fail, try - fail, try - fail, try - fail, try - fail, LEARN"

It happens like that in surfing a lot! Happy hunting

erinmck wrote:Yes, I do have an instructor and he is very good and tells me what I am doing wrong with my pop up so I do have the feedback.
Would you reccomend that I stay on the 7 foot and just keep up the work on my current board or go back to a larger one to perfect the pop up and then move back to the 7 foot once it feels more solid?

I would recommend listening to your instructor.

That's tough. I would ask your instructor what they thought but I learned to surf on a 6 foot 10 inch board (not a fish or wide board) and I was 6 foot 2 inches and weighed 165 pounds. It took me going every single day for 2 weeks to learn to catch waves paddling/popping up/not pearling. I had no instruction but I was very familiar with waves due to years of bodysurfing and body boarding and knee boarding. If you want to ride the shorter board, the quickest way is to just tough it out and ride it but only if you are not developing bad habits. If you want to surf, the quickest way is to use a bigger board. Either way you will have to struggle with the shorter board but if you get all the basics down with the bigger board then you would be less likely to develop bad habits with the shorter board.

Yes I agree and considering how long it took you (going every day for 2 weeks) makes me think if I put enough time into it I will be able to consistently pop up on the new board after I get more time in the water to practice. It is definitely a difficult call whether I should go back on a bigger board, but in a way it feels like to me if I do that I am going back to where I was before, and if I continue to persevere with the new board and work at it I will eventually get the hang of it Thanks again for your help! And the instructor seems to say that the board is fine for me and not too far out of my skill level, as it is a higher volume board, but he has not said it will be easy as a longboard, but not at all completely out of my skill range.

Not telling you what to do but don't think of it as 'going back to where you were before' think of it as taking the faster route to quicker progression. Make no mistake whatever you're not getting after 5 years of learning is going to take you longer on the shorter board.

Pushups....lots of pushups....throw in some pullups too...stretch & stretch and more stretching & practice pop ups at home......I'm probably older than you (44) but my biggest issue was with flexibility....once I loosened up my legs and hips getting my feet under me became alot easier....loads of videos on youtube for it, but starting with basics learned in gym class is a start...

I gotta go stretch now...