Surfing Waves

What can I do to keep the board from getting pulled into the water while catching a wave? What seems to happen is the nose of the board goes into the water as the board is being lifted up in the wave and then the surfboard gets pushed into the water as the wave carries it. This is on like 2-3 foot waves. This is just as the surfboard catches the wave and I am just about to stand up on it. Sometimes, as I am getting ready to stand up, it goes in the water at the nose and gets sucked in.

The waves break so quickly that it is really hard to catch them any earlier.

Can you give us some idea of the board shape/size and your height/weight/experience?

i think im reading this right - you are saying that as yoou paddle for a wave the nose digs into it? - If that is the case it sounds like you are too far forward on the board as the wave jacks up. Find a happy medium

Hi

I learned it this way. As the wave start to lift the board, arch your back, press your toes into the board ( if board is long enough). Then as you see the nose is not digging in, chest down on the board to get board to accelerate, a few more paddle strokes, and jump into the surfers stance. Catch the wave at 90 Degree.

You get through the critical point by arching your back. That is a temporary shift of centre of gravity aft.

Do not move aft on the board. You balance the board to find your position. Lie flat on the board, arms hanging into the water, vertical down. Nose of board 3 fingers above the water. Make a mark where your nose is. Keep that position ( always??? ).

Staying in the balanced position, you get more glide from the board and can catch the waves further out. Do not forget to paddle with power and determination once you go for a wave.

This is for a board around 8 feet. My experience as a learner. 3 seasons.

An additional reason may bee that your board does not have enough nose rocker, and / or that the surf is not of good quality, but more like plunging beach break.

Stand up.

Do a begginer cheat: point it at an angle instead of straight down the wave. Most experienced surfers can balance the board while on take off to avoid pearling (pearling=what you have been doing). So you aren't there yet, you haven't developed your wave sence enough to pull it off. So, Cheat.

When the wave comes paddles don't aim straight for the beach, aim at an angle towards the open face. Pro's still do it, I still do it, sometimes it's easier than doing a great bottom turn.

i agree with all the above but would say in my experience...arching my back and centre of gravity placement came more naturally to me then angling the board...im better then i was but still find it hard to not get sweeped off the board at a funny angle.

might just be me tho.

hey JB, ( pardon me while I )from reading your post it appears that we may be wrestling with some of the same problems. Regarding sinking the nose(pearling). everytime I go out i gather a few more pieces of the puzzle. here's what i've found. the whole business of actually catching a wave is a game of extreme subtleties and incremental adjustments.ie. too far forward vs. too far back, too much angle vs. not enough, popping up too soon vs. too late, good wave postion vs. bad, paddling for it hard vs. not enough. you get the picture. the fact that all of these things must happen near perfectly as well as simultaniously makes catching a wave difficult at best for the novice. the importance of a lightning fast pop-up is becoming more evident. back to pearling. I'm also surfing 2-3+ foot waves with a small curl and rapid closeout, not the prime choice for long boarders apparantly. after many pearl diving sessions, here's what is working for me now:
look outward for the waves coming, even if i see a hint of what might be a wave I turn and begin paddling. i'm sure it seems like I'm paddling waaaay too soon but I think i'm actually getting the forward momentum established. then, 10 and 2 baby, 10 and 2. just like your hands on a steering wheel, with the wave at your back and the beach at 12:00 angle for 10:00 or 2:00 wichever is away from the peak. ( i also struggle with this whole angle thing but after repeated attempts i find it cuts your chances of pearling way down). When i'm looking over my shoulder and am sure it really is a wave, I bear down and paddle like a moFo. I dont mean flailing and splashing, but i basically empty the tank, leave nothing for the dogs, use it all to propel yourself forward. if you miss the wave you should feel utterly spent and need a little rest. now here is the pivotal point, everything from here happens in less than 2 seconds. yes you are on your boards "sweet spot" but don't linger there for too long (pearl) you know the drill. the wave begins to lift you, if you have established enough forward momentum from your death paddle you may feel the forward glide a bit but just for a half second, BOOM! pop-up like your life depends on it, i'm tellin you its got to be fast. now here's the thing, the wave might just pass under you and leave you feeling that you popped up too soon. too soon you say? maybe by a .5 second, but you didn't pearl and it was a successful "attempt" at catching a wave. try again. this time wait a HAIR longer remember subtle, incremental adjustments. dont be suprised if you catch one, also dont be surprised when you do, to see the nose of your board sticking out the face of the wave kinda like a diving board for a second (weight on your back foot, seriously) till you actually drop in and bottom out. that's another thing to handle, you might catch it but the speed at which you drop in can cause you to lose your balance. but then you're like, "YA! didn't pearl, almost got it all right". just a small adjustment now and you'll be longboarding like, uh... I don't know, some really good longboarder...but probably not for like 6-10 more years...

have fun out there

You have a number of tools in your arsenal:

Get further outside and paddle faster.
Angle in the direction the wave is breaking.
Arch your back to pull the nose up.

drowningbitbybit wrote:Stand up.

And the fantastic advice continues.

I ride an 8' mini mal and sometimes pearl but it doesn't stop me catching the wave.
I usually turn the board to the open face anyway so I just pop up and go, the nose pulls out if i carry on a normal - ignorance is bliss!!!!!
I think as I stand I take the weight off the front a little so it lifts, not really sure but something seems to work! It happends less and less, so i must be doing someting right?

I have been trying with a longboard 8', more than 2' longer than me and I have a medium build with no beer belly. Catching the wave earlier would help, I think, but the waves break so fast that I have not been able to catch them earlier. I borrowed a friend's shortboard which was 6" longer than me, and I seemed to nose dive less...but it still seemed to nose dive. With the advice from the replies, I have a few things to try. As for positioning on the board, I was trying to put my feet on the very edge of the tail, so that I am farther aft. And I also was trying to catch the wave earlier, and paddle more. Still found that it nose dives. This is not when paddling out from the shore, but it is just as catching the wave and the wave picks up the board, then the nose goes in. This is when catching the wave right on at 90 degrees. The longboard is thick and has a lot of float, but it is also heavy. I think all the float makes the wave pick it up high. Next time I will try some of your advice.

When I see it nose diving, I usually stop and don't try to stand up, or if I am standing up go off the board because I don't want to wipe out or get thrown in front of the board.

Hi,

A Big Big Thank You to torben, paulyoffshore and lomax. Not only did they respond to the pearling question, they also wrote an excellent primer on catching a wave. Thank you also to jb987 for asking the question that's been in all our newbie minds.

My main problem has been pearling and this thread solved the problem! Thank you, Thank you! Three weekends ago I tried the "arching your back" suggestion and it worked! That was my missing link! I've been doing the angling thing for the past two months but it wasn't working--I'd catch the edge of the nose then pearl. Of all the suggestions I've tried, arching my back has worked by far the best and now I'm consistently not pearling. Yay!

What I found was that angling the board slightly off 90 degrees helps too, but not nearly as much as arching my back. As torben says, arching your back gets you through the critical point. Immediately after the critical point, having a slight angle helps by getting you going in the right direction. So now, I arch my back to load a bit more weight on my legs and toes (and keeps the nose up), make sure I'm on the wave, then pop-up. Once I'm up, I can then make any corrections to the angle and head in the direction I want to go. What I found was that if I couldn't get past the critical point, it didn't matter if the angle of the board was 90 or slightly off 90. Arching my back was the difference between pearling and popping up.

For all you Newbies, this discussion thread is the best advice for getting past pearling and catching a wave that I've read.

Nice job everybody and thanks for the tips!!! You guys and gals are the best!

torben wrote:Hi

I learned it this way. As the wave start to lift the board, arch your back, press your toes into the board ( if board is long enough). Then as you see the nose is not digging in, chest down on the board to get board to accelerate, a few more paddle strokes, and jump into the surfers stance. Catch the wave at 90 Degree.

You get through the critical point by arching your back. That is a temporary shift of centre of gravity aft.

Do not move aft on the board. You balance the board to find your position. Lie flat on the board, arms hanging into the water, vertical down. Nose of board 3 fingers above the water. Make a mark where your nose is. Keep that position ( always??? ).

Staying in the balanced position, you get more glide from the board and can catch the waves further out. Do not forget to paddle with power and determination once you go for a wave.

This is for a board around 8 feet. My experience as a learner. 3 seasons.

An additional reason may bee that your board does not have enough nose rocker, and / or that the surf is not of good quality, but more like plunging beach break.