Beginner surfers enter a world like they have never experienced. Surfing is more complex than it appears, but the beginner learns 3 fundamentals.
The Basics for a Beginner Surfer
The dry land lesson explains what a beginner has to accomplish to ride a surf board in the shore break foam waves. Then the student has to learn the lessons all over in the water because the dynamics cause lots of uncertainty. Not as easy as it would seem, balancing on the board and paddling level towards the beach are not easy with a tumultuous foam wave pushing from behind.
The most important aspect is the beginner needs patience to paddle until the surfboard is in front of the wave. So many beginners jump up before the wave has even hit the board or too soon while the tail is still in the froth. Kids and sometimes women don’t have the power to paddle until the board is ahead of the wave and to keep it going straight.
Catching the wave is timing. Catching a foam wave requires little skill compared to catching a real wave, but the fundamentals are the same. Start paddling before the wave arrives at an easy pace to get the board moving and level. Paddle hard for 3-5 strokes when the wave starts to push the board. Many beginners don’t change their pace from easy to fast paddling and the wave spins and flips the board.
The pop up is the athletic part of getting to a standing position. The body has to move smoothly and the feet have to land in the right spots and the posture needs to be exact. If the student swings into the wrong posture with the butt over a rail instead of in the middle of the board, the surfer falls in the water immediately. The difficult part of instructing beginners is they want to put a knee on the board first because they are fearful. (watch the pop up video below.)
The surfer has to go from the lying down position to having both feet on the board. The front foot has to be in the middle of the board far enough forward to keep the nose down. The hips and shoulders have to be square to the front with both hands in front. Snow boarders and skater boarders like to ride with a shoulder back and a hand trailing which doesn’t work for beginner surfers.
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For Surf Lessons in Oceanside see the Home Page
A good video for Catching Waves