Surfing Waves

Finally I'm able to angle along the wave, and actually perform bottom turns ( frontside). I have a problem maintaining speed along the wave. Should I put more pressure on the front of the board? Pumping? How do you know your in perfect trim with the wave? Also, at the end of my bottom turn, when i reach the top of the wave, it feels like I hit a brick wall and end up falling off because my body is perpendicular to the wave. I surf a 7'6 min mal and It seems hard to turn abruptly so that I can go back down the wave again. Also when making sudden turns, aside from put more pressure on back fins and rail, do you guys " grip" the board with both feet? By grip i mean do you guys from your standing position "press" your feet together to grip board?

maybe you should think about not getting so vertical so that you dont have to do such an abrupt turn back down the face. you can tell when you're trimming perfectly because you wont be having to put much if any effort into staying in the pocket. as for "gripping" the board im not too sure wt u mean there but to turn its a little weight on the back, look and then turn your body where you want to go and the board should follow. the tighter the turn the more weight on the back you need.

hope that helps a bit, and of course i may be spectacularly wrong.

When you're trimmed and moving down the line, try moving a tad closer to the nose of your board. I always see newer surfers riding with the noses of their boards in the air, it should be barely planeing over the surface of the water for maximum speed.

Thanks guys. I will apply what I've learned. I have a 6'2 fiber glass cordel which I think I might take out once this week just to see the difference in manuverability compared to my 7'6. I'm just worried I might damage it do to it being fiber glass rather than epoxy like my mini mal.

Woo, I just got a new 6'2 Cordel. Lovely board, but not such a great one for a beginner. It might be worth a try to see the difference.

Try to anticipate your turns and make smooth and controlled movements driving the turns through your hips.

Even if you don't actaully move your feet around on the board you will still need to move your weight backwards and forwards as you ride.

Oh yeah and kind of stay loose man and go with the flow of the wave dude . . .

ok. went surfing this morning and was practicing angling on wave and keeping ahead of white water. How much do you guys angle your board before the pop up? I think my problem is I'm not turning near the middle of the wave or top which produces the most power. I'm trimming almost at bottom of wave which i think is slowing me down. Upon drop, do you guys first dig your fins into wave at an angle to turn mid way down the wave then start trimming?

Huntington,
Alot depends on the wave for me. If I drop in and it's a fairly steep wave, sometimes all you can do is make a sharp bottom turn and walk toward the nose of your board to gain speed and trim up down the line. Big mushy waves you don't usually have to do such a sharp bottom turn and can angle much earlier onto the face of the wave.

Hope this helps some...

See you in the lineup!

You ever come down to San Diego to surf?

hehe. I actually never surfed in san diego yet, but lived there all my life until I came up to CSULB. Ironically enough, I didn't start surfing until 3-4 weeks ago and so happened to just start in huntington. Haven't surfed anywhere else. I go down twice a month to SD to see family. Any places you recommend in SD? I like huntington because it seems like there are a variety of waves, and no STING RAYS. lol.

I've been surfing 6 days a week since. Surfing is such an addiction to me that it seems more a priority to me than my career. lol