Surfing Waves

Strong onshore wind and white wash. I was reluctant to get in but after driving 290 miles and 6 hours, I didn't want to waste all that effort.

Looks so bad, I just don't know how to surf in bad conditions. The only thing I tried doing was to set my front foot at 1 o'clock position and to put my feet closer to the fin.








Bonus clip for getting this far.

Clips 3 and 4 are showing how much you have improved, you even pulled off a wave instead of jumping off.
You are still trying to force a " Comeback" by leaning rather than turning and you lose some speed on the face by being a little too far back so more moving on the board is needed.
But you forehand turning has improved .

I like the three cuddly things at the end of the first couple of clips

Every one has been telling me if I can ride on the rough days it makes the clean ones all that much more enjoyable. 290 miles?! I need to stop complaining about driving 30 miles. all in perspective I guess. Nice work!

300thumper wrote:Every one has been telling me if I can ride on the rough days it makes the clean ones all that much more enjoyable. 290 miles?! I need to stop complaining about driving 30 miles. all in perspective I guess. Nice work!

I don't know about that but if you ride only on good days (unless you live in the super secret spot that has good waves every day) you will find yourself spending time relearning how to surf each time. Maybe it is just a wave or two or a few waves or it could be a few days of surfing till you get back to where you left off. So if you want to learn to surf faster you need to surf more often. The more often you surf the less you unlearn. The older you are the more frequent this needs to be. I think a younger mind and body learns sports like surfing quicker than an older mind and body and retains it better. Young = more adaptable Old = less adaptable. I surf junk waves all the time but when the good waves come I am ready for them.

1) too narrow stance that leads to flailing arms.

2) You reach down and lean instead of pivoting and turning. That leads to you upper body disconnecting from the lower part. Extreme lean forward leads to you trying to recover and falling back.

3) Back hand was in front most of the wave. Back hand is the power maker, Front hand should steer and lead the way.

4) Moved to the middle to early ( maybe because you popped up to early ? ) that caused a see-saw back to front hop that cut your speed

5) better wave that lead to longer ride. But again, reach forward, fell backward. Cause and Effect.

6) It was like a nice snap under the lip with some spray. But it was more a fall recovery. But great reflexes.

Overall, too much fulcrum from knees down. Like sitting on a tall chair and swinging you legs beneath you.

I would rather you use more rail transitions instead of tail turns. Watch some skateboard longboard cruisers going down a slight hill. You seem to be doing all "tapping" or tick-tacks.

I was watching these last night and noticed you seemed to be off balance quite a lot. So your feet were shooting out side to side and you were wobbling a lot. Now perhaps you just have no sense of balance... but after thinking about it for a bit I came to the same conclusion as waikikichan - that is, upper body disconnecting from the lower part / too much fulcrum from knees down. Your upper body is moving up and down but your knees aren't moving; then your feet move but you try to keep your upper body in the same place.

I'm not sure what the cause is; perhaps you are a bit too stiff in the hips? Or maybe in the knees? Possibly you just have some balance issues, such as weaker ankles - practice standing on one leg for a while (alternate legs and move the 'non standing' leg around a bit).

I also think your movements are a bit too sudden and forceful - on a longboard, in particular, its all smooth gliding

Also, you are still jumping up and down a bit (tick tacking, as waikikichan says). If you need more speed, just weight forward. Or literally take a step forward. You can't force a longboard, you have to work with it. The whole pumping the board thing is much more a shortboarders game.

But your pop up looks nice (a bit of leg spread at the last second but that's ok) and you are catching the waves well.

waikikikichan wrote:6) It was like a nice snap under the lip with some spray. But it was more a fall recovery. But great reflexes.

I've watched that part a few times and I still don't know whether it was intention or not. It is more likely as you said that it was a fall recovery.

I bought a longboard skateboard last year, got on it a few times and I was so scared to go on it. I tried it a few times and gave up.

Surfed pretty badly this time because I was scared. There were only 1-2 surfers and the beach was big. It also wasn't my regular beach. Water was murky so it really frightened me. I'm a wimp I can't surf alone especially when it is so windy and white wash.

Another problem is that the boots are 1 size too big and I'm having difficulty but that shouldn't be an excuse as the last set of videos, I was surfing much better.

I'll be surfing again this weekend in rough conditions at a local beach. No video but maybe I'll mount a gopro.

I will try harder this time and make smoother transition.....!

You looked pretty comfortable in the waves actually.

BaNZ wrote:

waikikikichan wrote:Another problem is that the boots are 1 size too big and I'm having difficulty but that shouldn't be an excuse as the last set of videos, I was surfing much better

No excuse at all, surfing in too big boots suck. Feels like timing between your brain and feet are way off. Not to mention the squishing water sound.

BaNZ wrote:I will try harder this time and make smoother transition.....!

" No ! Try not. Do or Do Not, there is no Try " to quote some little green guy ( not kermit ). You "try" when you're not doing something normal/natural. Surf to your ability. Be yourself.

You'll surf better ( and make smoother transitions ) when you start listening to the wave. Work "with" it. Right now you're just "reacting" to it.

The word try is about an attempt that fails "nice try" you cannot try to touch a wall you either touch the wall or you don't. Go out and surf stop over thinking go have a really big browse of Waikikikichan's surf blog, his explanations have you covered.
Commit to your surfing while you are on the wave , NO FEAR.

Banz is already a brave man, he's putting his vidz up here for critique! Well done man I applaud you, and the humility to learn from everyone else. Keep it up brother!