Going down the line

[jackharley]

i can easily catch waves and easily do bottom turns but after that i just fall off the back of the wave. what am i doing wrong?

[IB_Surfer]

you need stay higher up on the wave, sounds like you are going to the bottom and not pumping on the wall

[waikikikichan]

Sounds like you're going Up and Out. To go down the line, you need to disengage your rail a bit and set your line to trim. It's not a turn down. Also where you look is where you go. From even before your feet touch the board, you should be looking down the line.

[IB_Surfer]

LOL, we gave different advice entirely. Try both LOL

[waikikikichan]

it's not totally clear what the true problem is, so advice might differ. But as i figured his back foot might not be on the tail pad ( from his earlier post ), he is not looping out and falling backwards. Being that he wants to bottom turn but with a forward bias, his turn is front footed more like a snowboarders. Thus the front rail bites and the board just runs Up and Out the back of the wave.

[jaffa1949]

Sounds like you're going Up and Out. To go down the line, you need to disengage your rail a bit and set your line to trim. It's not a turn down. Also where you look is where you go. From even before your feet touch the board, you should be looking down the line.

As shown by Charlie here in Rote

[Big H]

it's not totally clear what the true problem is, so advice might differ. But as i figured his back foot might not be on the tail pad ( from his earlier post ), he is not looping out and falling backwards. Being that he wants to bottom turn but with a forward bias, his turn is front footed more like a snowboarders. Thus the front rail bites and the board just runs Up and Out the back of the wave.

....or it just bogs out with too much weight on the front foot and the wave rolls on under him leaving him behind....

[IB_Surfer]

I read that that after the bottom he falls off the board, meaning that he takes the turn too wide and just dumps his speed, therefore my advise was to pump the wave to keep up speed and keep going down the line. Not sure if that is the problem to begin with, but I guess we'll find out when he responds.

[yumyumyellow]

If you are surfing soft and/or small waves, a "proper" bottom turn may not be necessary and may actually be hindering you. You may need to angle the take off a bit more (or a lot more, depending on situation), start the bottom turn before you actually reach the bottom of the wave, or some combo of both. Doing a full, out-into-the-flats bottom turn on smaller, weaker waves will burn off all your speed. Just try all the things I mentioned and eventually it will be second nature and you won't even have to think about it.

EDIT

Another way to put it, and this way of thinking really helped me when I was learning, is that you should NEVER be in the flats. There's no reason to be there (at this stage, in the waves you'll be in). Many early beginners surf almost entirely in the flats, even if they're angled just enough to be pushed going down the line. So yea, don't ever be in the flats. Surf the face of the wave and you'll have so much more speed which opens up more options for you.

[jackharley]

thanks for all the replies but what exactly is the difference between pumping and triming?

[oldmansurfer]

trimming is aiming the board down the line and holding it at that optimal angle. Pumping is turning top to bottom to top to bottom to use gravity to gain speed