progress!!!!!!!!!!

elheffe

was out in lahinch this morning (sunday) and the swell was pumping. about five foot on the sets. i had with me an 8ft board. have it a couple of months now. the wave that i am catching literally has to be about to break before the board will catch it. have tried everything changing position, paddling like a maniac ect, but nothing works.
while out this guy passed me on a rented 9ft4 soft board and went right out the back. he was catching waves not a bother and cutting up and down the face of the wave. how i asked myself. what was i doing wrong.
so is it the board or just me. should i change it. have been surfing for eight months so still am a beginner....
any ideas.....

promethius

elheffe wrote: »

was out in lahinch this morning (sunday) and the swell was pumping. about five foot on the sets. i had with me an 8ft board. have it a couple of months now. the wave that i am catching literally has to be about to break before the board will catch it. have tried everything changing position, paddling like a maniac ect, but nothing works.
while out this guy passed me on a rented 9ft4 soft board and went right out the back. he was catching waves not a bother and cutting up and down the face of the wave. how i asked myself. what was i doing wrong.
so is it the board or just me. should i change it. have been surfing for eight months so still am a beginner....
any ideas.....

i'd watch what the other lad is doing, it's working

not meaning to give a smart answer there but experience of where to sit, when to paddle and when not to paddle is very important. sounds like this other guy has it figured out.

i can think of a guy who paddles very little but gets loads of waves, he knows exactly when the effort's required and when to relax and let it go.

8ft is a decent size of board unless you're huge and sounds like you're paddling ok. when you say changing position, do you know that on a board like yours that you need weight at the front to catch, then shift back once you've caught it and pop up?

agreenyblue

Experiment. Rent or swap boards and see what you think.

dermo909

It definitely sounds like that guy has it all figured out!

(I'm no expert but)you may need more practice with catching waves. Dont worry about getting the big ones, just log loads of time in the water catching as many waves as you can. You say that the wave has to be breaking on your head before you can catch it. Sounds like you are not going fast enough to effectively catch green waves. If you are'nt going fast enough, then the wave will pass you by.

Go out on a calm day and experiment with body position until you can get maximum speed while paddling. You'll get to know the sweet spot on the board very quickly. You'll be paddling faster with less effort. You may have to adjust you body position either forwards or backwards depending on the oncoming wave though.

Something that helps me a lot when catching green waves is to drop my head close to the board and arch my back when I'm just about to catch a green wave. Coupling this with giving a few more deep/strong paddles and waiting for the back of the board to lift really helps to get into waves.

Someone said here before: Set yourself a quota and dont leave the water until you either get that amount or are so knackered that you could'nt possibly catch another one. On a good day you should be at least able to knock out anywhere between 30 - 50 waves.

elheffe

thanks for advice all, bit of work to do. can be frustrating but thats human error i guess but when it goes right its dam good...... will work on positioning more, maybe renting as agreenyblue suggested and working the basics would be good also.
cheers all

JohnyOhio

Still learning myself and been sticking to large white water on an 8ft softboard. Been popping up on most waves and turning both directions.

At the weekend at low tide the waves were breaking smaller and much slower out the back so went out there and was able to catch quite a few.... I think this was purely because they weren't very big, fast, or to me most importantly, they weren't very steep. Was able to get onto a few green waves and was awesome, but can see it has to be pretty small and slow for my ability.
I've watched a lot of video's on the 'surf simply' guys Youtube channel who explain a lot of detail in their lessons.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVyatMUYwZw&feature=related

This vid is pretty helpful too about positioning on the board.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Nl7_ONEjTQ