How does he do that? Duck diving with JJF

[surf patrol]

Am I the only one impressed with a duck dive?
It makes me look like a kook knowing I cant get even closely as deep as he does!

For sure would make me feel more confident when duck diving bigger waves, how does he do it? Shaking the board one side to the other so it pushs itself down? I need a pool to try that, dont want to look stupid in the beach shaking my board in the line up like a crazy dude

[IanCaio]

Didn't manage to embed the video, but the link is fine!

[oldmansurfer]

to imbed it you need to remove every thing except what is after the last backslash and put that between the youtube codes so in your case it would be q9CWeIJDphc. What I ususally do is copy the whole code then paste it between the youtube codes and backspace through the part I want to remove. I saw this before and 2 things I will say about John Florence and duck diving, one is he uses small boards for his size and two is he is really fit and highly skilled in all aspects of surfing

[drowningbitbybit]

Am I the only one impressed with a duck dive?

I've always been impressed by the elegance of a well-performed duckdive.

I still get a bit of a rush from a duckdive - there's nothing like the feeling of the wave coming down just behind you (sometimes even on your outstretched foot), and then seeing the bright water behind the wave which means you've made it

JJF's method though... how? what? huh?

[surf patrol]

I was out one day and paddling back out with another surfer, he was level with me about 10 ft away to my right. A set wave came towards us and as it approached I noticed he started his duckdive. It was way earlier that I would have gone, I couldn't understand why he was going so early. I ducked as normal and got pulled back a little. When I came up he was about 20 feet further out that I was. I couldn't understand how he managed it.
Watching this makes it much clearer.

[IanCaio]

Once on a bigger day I got holded down twice on a row because I made a too shallow duck dive with the wave breaking on my back (didn't listen to Turtle )

I'll still learn to duck dive like that!


"If the wave breaks here, don't be there!"

[oldmansurfer]

Where the lip is coming down often the force goes right into the bottom so duck diving is not going to keep you from getting pounded. I guess there are breaks where you can duck dive a lip maybe a small wave lip but on bigger waves When the wave is like this don't be there.

[IanCaio]

Well, I feel a bit better that it wasnt a bad duck dive, but a bad decision that made me get drilled

I can recall people were paddling to the sides, and I was paddling towards the breaking wave like "come at me bra!". Maybe I should have waited until the lip hitted the bottom and then duck dived through it.

Nobody listens to turtle..

[drowningbitbybit]

Maybe I should have waited until the lip hitted the bottom and then duck dived through it.

It's a perfectly legitimate technique!
Big set on the horizon... if you know you can't get behind it, the best thing to do is to be as far in front of it as you can. Let the lip detonate, and then it loses its energy as it crumbles towards you.
You're still gonna have to do a really good duck dive to get under the wall of white water, but you've got a better chance than when the lip lands on top of you

[billie_morini]

Ian,
thanks for sharing this video. It is so helpful because you can clearly see what is being doNe. I'll be better for having seen this.
billie

[benjl]

Yeah this clip is mental! Totally blown my idea of a duck dive away.

I doubt I'll have the weight to overcome my board volume to get it down and fully hold it down though!

[IanCaio]

It looks like he "digs" the water with the board, like using the water resistence to push the board down. First sliding it down sideways (less resistence since the rails have less area, and easy the flow of water) and then pushing it up (more surface, more resistence). All that mixed with leg "kicks" to push your weight down.
At least thats my theory on whats happening there, but still seems like something quite hard to accomplish

[asilomarsurfer]

He has also been surfing since age 4.

That helps just a bit.