parallel and vertical weight shifting

[hcfkavh]

can anyone explain parallel and vertical weight shifts and how it's used in surfing?

also for turning (bottom, top, cutback, etc) I read, initiate turns starting from the head down (head, shoulders, hips) and I also read the opposite, using hips knees and ankles.

[oldmansurfer]

I think there is a lot of variations in surfing on how you do stuff and partly it depends on the waves and the board. The rest is personal preference and ability. I originally started surfing because I recognized the benefit of shifting your weight in a standing position vs all other possible positions. Back when I learned to surf on a surfboard the first time, I worked at weight shifting and what it amounts to is altering your center of gravity or shifting your weight. If you watch the pros surf you would think "wow that is a fast board" and while it may be a fast board it is the surfer who is making it go fast by weight shifting. Vertical weight shifting may be a little easier because unless you are on big waves you mostly shift the lower half of your body up and down the wave by crouching and extending your legs. It feels sometimes like jumping from the bottom to the top of the wave but since at the top you are usually turning right back down again you don't need to get your upper body weight to the top so you keep your upper body in a position that is leaning toward the beach and down the line a little and your legs will come back down underneath you.
Horizontal weight shift is more difficult to learn and to explain but if you skateboard it's like leaning forward then scooting your hips forward to make the board move forward. It's often used in conjunction with a bottom turn so while bottom turning lean forward to ward the tip of your board and then bring your lower portion of your body up under you. The Huntington Hop is another version of horizontal weight shift.

Using your ankles first or simultaneous to leaning or after depends on many things. I used to do a lot of different variations in my normal surfing of that sequence. When I take off on a steep wave I often ankle turn at the top then lean in at the bottom. When I was using a longboard I used to ankle turn and lean simultaneously to cutback. I find if I do that with my current board I loose the rail in the turn so I just let my weight sink into the deck and not use my ankles. On a bottom turn I may do both simultaneously or not if the wave is huge.

[oldmansurfer]

As far as the head or feet thing, hmmmmmmmm, I generally try to use my whole body in turns. It's only in larger waves that I don't use my ankles ever (I think). It is pretty amazing the things we do surfing considering often we don't exactly know what we are doing. People may say use your lower body or some may say lead with your shoulders.....but I don't care what they say I like the way I surf.

[hcfkavh]

So parallel weight shift is that scooping motion with the hips that you see pros do in videos when bottom turning? Is it used in cutbacks as well?

This other question is not really related but as I'm taking off on a steep, powerful wave and angling right, the nose of my board swings into the wave and my inside rail "bites" and I end up taking a high line. Other times I just drop to the bottom and I get caught behind the section. I can never recreate that rail engaged feeling on small waves (3 ft and under). I try leaning into the inside rail as I pop up but I end up bogging. Do you need a powerful wave in order to do that?

[Big H]

Check out from the 35 sec mark....what I'm working on now same issue you are talking about....

[oldmansurfer]

I think weight shifting is used in every maneuver by advanced surfers, cutback included. it is the connector between moves and part of the moves themselves. I am not really sure the distinction between parallel and horizontal weight shifting as there is often motion in both directions but for me sometimes I want to move the board horizontally and that is what I would call horizontal weigh shifting. In actual practice I move the board vertically often as well. So I would say horizontal is to get around a section and vertical is for speed or to do a maneuver. And by the way there is more directions than 2 in the world so saying there are only 2 kinds of weight shifting isn't accurate but then surfing lingo tends to lack accuracy. We are surfers not dictionaries

Riding bigger more powerful waves is easier because they supply most of the power. On small weak waves you need to generate the speed and power. One of the things I try to do is to exaggerate my turns. So when I take off and drop down the wave I extend my legs till just before the bottom then I bend my knees and let my weight drop further while I start to turn and then extend my legs as I turn to put more force into the turn then my weight falling down the face of the wave is translated into lateral movement down the wave and enhanced a little with my antics. Then I turn up to the top of the wave immediately and turn back down immediately. In the turn at the top I also try to bend my knees as I hit the turn so my weight moving up the wave is translated into moving back down the wave.

As far as taking a high line goes, you must not ride the same steep waves I ride. I don't usually push the rail in unless I am almost in free fall and I go straight to the the bottom regardless of what else I do but pushing the rail in keeps me from getting into the flats. But what I would do if my board took a high line and I didn't want to is to turn down the wave and make a bottom turn and exaggerate it it like I explained above. Sometimes when I am just riding a slow weak wave and want to get some speed up for a coming section, I drop quickly into a crouch while turning then extend my legs to get some force in the turn and get higher on the wave (shift my weight higher) then turn back down.

I used to surf before and quit for a number of years then restarted a few years ago. At first I surfed 30 minutes a week. At that rate it took me about 3 years till I felt I had a decent frontside bottom turn. Surfing takes time spent in the ocean learning to read and ride waves.

[oldmansurfer]

One other thing about the the high line problem. Back when I was first learning to surf I remember doing that. I wanted to get going down the line quickly but I still wanted to do a bottom turn but found myself going on a high line. What I did then is to learn to angle less so that I still go to the bottom and make a bottom turn.

[oldmansurfer]

One way to think of weight shifting is riding a swing. If you just sit there it's hard to get going without pushing yourself or someone else pushing you but it can be done if you shift your weight back and forth the swing will start to move. As it moves a greater and greater distance it becomes easier to continue swinging. Similarly when you are surfing on a small wave you need to exert more effort shifting your weight and on bigger waves less effort. (which is one of the reasons I like bigger waves)

[hcfkavh]

thanks for the replies, I've been trying to learn how to generate speed by pumping. i distinctly remember doing it once but haven't been able recreate that feeling. i tell myself to extended after pop up but it doesn't turn out that way. it's mostly just mediocre beach breaks here so it's hard to get past sections. i feel like if I can generate speed it'll help out my surfing a lot. usually when I get more wave face to work with I just end up doing bottom turn, top turn.

in terms of consistency when riding waves, is it something that just clicked or did you gradually build up to it? my sessions are pretty inconsistent.

[oldmansurfer]

I think in learning to surf it goes through spurts so you kind of seem the same then suddenly you get something and improve. Initially it is just a grind of going out and learning to read and ride the waves with little improvements. I think the amount of time you spend surfing and your fitness and athleticism all affect how quickly you learn. When I learned to surf long ago I learned pretty fast but this time around I am not surfing anywhere near as much and I am not anywhere near as fit as I was back then. I still have some reflexes that help me and I know waves so that makes it easier but overall it's taking me a long time in terms of years since I restarted to learn anything. Once you learn to generate speed on your bottom turn really well that will then allow you to have more options in terms of waves to ride or secondary maneuvers to do.
Inconsistency to me means you are probably surfing inconsistently as in not regularly weekly or daily. I think if the period of time when you don't surf gets long enough then you have lost some skill and need to surf for a while just to regain that. Not surfing for a long enough time may mean you have to go more than one session to get back to where you were the last time you surfed (like a month ago)

[waikikikichan]

Here's a post from my surf blog about "Pumping for Speed" - http://alohaki.jugem.jp/?eid=524

And one about "Riding a swing to help you pump" - http://alohaki.jugem.jp/?day=20141218

Pumping for speed, like more sports, is the WHEN ( timing ). The What is easy. Try standing on a swing and compress when you should extend, or do the moment "before" you should. Everything gets messed up. So for pumping. Timing of the pump ( the WHEN ), angle and pressure of the rail , Position on the wave ( the WHERE ) all need to be in perfect sync.

But I would say to try closing your eyes ( yeah, i know crazy, so don't do it at a heavy beach break or crowded spot ) or Night Surf. By cutting out or lowering your sense of sight you need to rely more on FEEL. And that's what the pump is, the Resist and Relax. You pushing against the wave and the wave pushing back at you.

[hcfkavh]

Sorry I should have clarified by inconsistent I mean my wave riding is inconsistent. Sometimes I feel like I'm more connected to the wave and can do a couple maneuvers and kick out cleanly whereas other days I popup and feel like I'm falling the whole 1-2 seconds that the wave lasts (which as been happening my last couple sessions). I usually make a trip to the nearest point/reef break to gauge my progress, those sessions are much more enjoyable, but 90% of the time I surf at beach breaks. I surf 2-3x/week, I'm probably just a slow learner.

[oldmansurfer]

If you are consistently riding 2-3 x a week on the same board then it is likely the waves are different

[oldmansurfer]

To expand on this there is more to a wave than one might initially think. There is size but much more beyond that such as speed, direction of swell, number of swells there may be more than one swell, shape and steepness, what the tide is doing affects how the waves break, the wind also affects how the waves break and to top it off if you are surfing a sand break then the bottom is constantly changing. The waves will change over the course of a day and on another day it may be a whole different swell or the same swell but the direction changed. I surf a sand break and every time I need to learn which waves are the ones to ride and which ones aren't . After a while you may recognize themes or general types of breaks and waves but it is always slightly different as there are endless varieties of waves

[hcfkavh]

the shift in the sand bottom can be pretty frustrating, I think my wave selection is improving but some days I only manage to get waves that close out or I have to kick out shortly after pop up if I have the time to.

thanks for the blog posts, for the concept of weighting and unweighting, I would think that would work best on a slope-y wave, one that isn't too steep yet not flat either. would this be different when trying to gain additional speed in a steep, fast breaking wave? I usually find myself surfing those kind of waves that break very fast and I always get caught behind. I can never get enough control after pop up to start pumping down the line to get past fast sections, I just set my line on a wave that breaks wide and hope I get to the shoulder, sometimes I do sometimes I don't.

[oldmansurfer]

Weighting and unweighting can work for slow slopey waves but you need to exert more effort for less return it's what I called exaggerating your turns. The best returns are from steeper and bigger waves (not the huge waves) . By the way I didn't mention longboard weight shifting which would include weighting and unweighting and stepping forward and backward on the board. So it sounds like you are just at that stage. I think people often look at surfing and think "that looks so easy... I can do that" but in reality it take so many things coming together. You need to have the right waves and surfboard for your skill level then you need to able to read the waves and figure out where to paddle, then you need to be able to paddle well enough to match the speed of the wave, then you need to know how to stand on a moving board (quickly) then you need to know how to get down the face of the wave a little so you are riding it without pearling, then you need to know how to turn and to read the wave and know when to do what turn. Each of those steps requiring many actions..... it still amazes me that I can surf with all that you have to do.

[oldmansurfer]

there are lots of surf videos about how to do things surfing but hard to find one showing the top end of something. They generally have beginners or average surfers doing these maneuvers. If you watch pro surfers they are very good at weighting and unweighting. I was looking for something else but found this that may apply to you and also demonstrates forward unweighting. If you notice the frozen part of the picture with the surfer frozen in a bottom turn he is leaning forward and when he releases the compression of this turn will spring forward as well as up the wave.

[hcfkavh]

My main problem is just not reacting to the wave quick enough, that'll just take time for me to get use to. The weighting and unweighting part isn't too hard to wrap my head around it's just when to do it, that's my difficulty. I think I tend to rush my bottom turns and they're usually more vertical I have a feeling I extend my legs quickly a split second after popup. Sometimes I am able to top turn or rebound back down the wave and other times I reach the top of the wave and fall off backwards. For a more drawn out bottom turn do you just stay compressed for a longer period of time then gradually extend the legs? This is something that could be clarified through video footage.

[waikikikichan]

My main problem is just not reacting to the wave quick enough, that'll just take time for me to get use to. The weighting and unweighting part isn't too hard to wrap my head around it's just when to do it, that's my difficulty.

By the time you see what's happening, and the eyes sends the signals to your brain to react, it's too late. You need to be pro-active not reactive. Thus rely less on your eyes and more on feel. Another sense you need to use is Hearing. Listen to the wave. Surfing is like a dance. What is the rhythm, what is the beat you need to move to.

For a more drawn out bottom turn do you just stay compressed for a longer period of time then gradually extend the legs ?

What is your goal for the drawn out bottom turn ? To get more out onto the face or more high up the lip ?

[oldmansurfer]

Yes you can stay on the bottom turn for a while more to slow down or to time the next move a little better. Sometimes I will extend a bottom turn if I want to get around a section but probably if I can make it around it would be even better if I go from bottom turn to forward unweighting as forward unweighting after a bottom turn is extended is so much less dramatic than doing it from a normal bottom turn. However the reason I do extend it is that even without the forward unweighting I can get a lot of speed down the line from a bottom turn. I do not think much when I surf but I am looking to see what the wave will allow me to do. It will all come with more time in the water I am learning too (relearning). It takes time. I know I still sometimes just go for a bottom turn when maybe I will just shoot past the section if I use a forward unweighting with the bottom turn. I had a very nice wave recently where I did that backside twice on the same wave. It takes time to make these things a part of your surfing because you don't generally have time to consider your options.