by oldmansurfer » Fri Jul 22, 2022 7:20 pm
I wrote this on Facebook ten years ago too. An addendum I have been hit by an SUP and bruised my shin and split my toe nail.
Wiping out is a part of surfing and even more if you push your limits more. I imagine I have wiped out thousands of times but can only remember a few times. One was where I almost drowned on a big day at Hanalei and I wrote a note about it (one of the earlier ones). Other than getting injured or almost killed there isn't usually much else to say about wiping out. You get tossed around by the water and then you come up and have to get out of the impact zone before you get pounded more.
Sometimes you know you are going to wipe out so you have a chance to take some action although usually you will still take a pounding maybe not as bad. Generally speaking if you have a board cord then you want to kick the board away from you as you wipe out. The board can hit you and that can injure you so usually if I can I kick the board away from me. I have noticed lately that some surfers at pipeline jump vertically off their board. I haven't done that but I assume it is to get deep in the water and avoid getting sucked back over the falls after wiping out. If it is shallow you really don't want to do that because you may hit the bottom and other than your board the bottom is the thing most likely to injure you in a wipe out. There is one other obstacle and that is other surfers and their boards and there is not much you can do about them but try not to wipe out near other surfers. If I do I try to kick my board away from them if possible.
I haven't ever hit the bottom badly in a wipe out. This may be because of my days as a body surfer where I learned to prepare for the bottom and keep oriented so I know when I am heading that direction. Or it might possibly be due to similar reflexes that develop with years of wave riding experience. When I wipe out I automatically do things to avoid the bottom. I have had a few run ins with my board on wipe outs and I will tell you some stories about some of those. I haven't really had problems with other peoples boards when I wiped out but have been hit by others when they wiped out or got pounded going through the surf.
Once I was surfing Horners on a 6 foot day (wave faces around 10 feet). I got tubed and wiped out and when I came up my board was no where to be seen. I had a surf leash on and was thinking it must have broke. Suddenly I felt something raking across my legs and thought "Shark!" but it was my board which came shooting up between my legs. I wasn't injured much but had red marks on my legs from the skeg scratching as the board shot up.
One day at Kealia I wiped out and ended up getting hit by my board in the calf. It didn't hurt much and I didn't notice any injury so I kept on surfing. A couple waves later I was sitting on my board and noticed some green stuff floating by in the water. I didn't know what it was and caught another wave and was once again sitting on my board in the water waiting for a wave and noticed the green stuff floating by my right leg and the right side of my surfboard. I watched closely and it seemed to be coming out of my leg so I pulled my leg out of the water and looked closely and there was a little hole where the board had poked me. I squeezed my calf and blood came squirting out of the hole. Blood looks green filtered through the water, something I didn't know till then. It continued to bleed for 45 minutes after I came in.
Once I was surfing at Waikokos (the far side of Hanalei bay) which is a left making me surf with my backside to the wave. It was a real good day breaking about 4 to 6 feet (8 to 12 foot faces). I had numerous tube rides but this one wave I was in the tube a long time and the wave started to break faster than my board could go so I tried to do a little turn to speed up the board but it resulted in my head touching the lip. This rushing water from the lip just barely pushed my head over but I was unable to pull it back and gradually it kept pushing my head over and further down till I was crouched all the way down then it really grabbed my head and pulled me off my board. I had visions of my head getting slammed into the reef and actually ended up doing a shoulder roll on the reef but emerged unharmed (shoulder roll is a skill I learned in Judo classes).
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The absolutely scariest wipeout I had was at Kealia beach. I caught a wave and rode it all the way to the shore where the wave actually broke right on to the dry sand. I planned on jumping off and ending up standing on the sand but unfortunately the wave jumped up a little and flipped my board out from under my feet. I went up in the air and the board landed on the sand with the fin pointing up. I fell right on the fin. I could see that this was going to happen and tried to keep from landing too hard and I did manage not to be seriously injured but an inch one way and I would have been talking in a much higher voice and an inch the other way and I would have lost my virginity.
In the days before I started using a surf leash I had several wipe outs where I fell off the board and continued on the same wave body surfing and once I actually body surfed up to my board grabbed it and stood up finishing off the wave standing again. I had done a similar thing before a couple times when I wiped out and lost my board and caught a later wave in body surfing and body surfed right up to my board and grabbed it finishing the wave board surfing.
Also in the days before surf leashes I had an injury from a collision between me and my board when I was surfing Hanalei on an 8 foot day (12 to 15 foot faces). I saw a huge section breaking in front of me so I turned and went straight up the face of the wave. I think my board hit the lip as it cleared the top of the wave so it went airborne for a couple feet and dropped back down but I was launched 15 or more feet into the air above the top of the wave. As I dropped back down I could see I was going to come down on my board. I tried to turn my body to avoid it but in the air there is not much you can do to change your trajectory. I didn't want to land square on it so I put my feet to the side and they hit the side of the board causing damage to the board and my heel.
Wiping out is inevitable but it didn't used to bother me. Since I quit surfing and started back up again, I find myself starting to panic a little when I get held under by larger waves. It seems to be happening less and less with me and I think it may have to do with my conditioning. I used to be in great shape and now I am in mediocre shape. Really I think it has to do with being used to being out of breath. I have been hiking a couple days a week and lately I have started pushing myself so that I am out of breath and huffing and puffing for a good distance. You don't get a chance to catch your breath before you wipe out. These days I have tried to be careful to not take off on waves if I am still winded from paddling out but still paddling to catch a wave and then doing maneuvers on the wave can get you out of breath again. So when I am out of breath and under the water my mind wants oxygen. I think the hiking will help to keep me from feeling panicked under the water. However I haven't been held under by bigger waves lately so it still remains to be seen. I met a guy who had a bad wipe out. He got caught with another guys surf leash wrapped around his neck choking him. The guy kept pulling him thinking his board was stuck on the reef or something. He almost drowned and was psychologically affected and quit surfing for a while. He told me he feels panic when he gets held under too. He thinks it is related to his accident but I think maybe it is the same as me, he needs to get in better shape.
One odd thing about wiping out. Often people judge surfers by how much they wipe out. Back when I first learned to surf I surfed by myself almost always till one day my surfer friends who knew I had taken up board surfing invited me to surf with them at Kealia. I hadn't surfed at Kealia before nor in overhead waves not so much because I was afraid but I figured smaller waves are easier. On my first wave after paddling out I dropped down and overturned at the bottom because I was off balance sending me flying up to the top where I was off balance again and overturned back to the bottom, I continued to almost fall down on every turn but made it to where the wave got small and cut out. I was thinking "Whew, I hope those guys didn't see me on that wave." One of my friends paddled up to me and said "Dave I thought you said you couldn't surf?" I responded "Yeah isn't it obvious? Did you see me on that last wave?" He answered back "Yeah bra, you shredded it". I felt like I was almost falling down for the whole wave but because I didn't fall down he thought I knew how to surf.
Another example of this was when I started surfing again a very nice young Korean woman was learning how to surf at the same time I was relearning. She once told me "You are a very good surfer." I thought she was confusing me with someone else and answered "no I am not very good." But she insisted that I was a very good surfer so I said " I used to be very good but that was long ago and I am no longer very good." She responded "No. You very good. You no fall down." I didn't fall down much so I am very good.
So what is worse.... dying or regretting it for the rest of my life? Obviously I chose not regretting it.
Taking the long way around is my best option.
