Surfing Waves

I'm regular stance and when I surf a right hand break. While I'm trying to gain speed by going up and down the wave. Sometimes my rear feet that is closer to the tail is slowing myself down. My rear feet is dragging thru the water. I'm not entirely sure what is going on. Is my rear feet too far back on the tail causing the tail to submerge into the water? Perhaps this is where I should be doing cross step and move towards the nose? Or is the lip of the wave hitting my rear feet causing the drag?

This probably occurs 1 in 10 wave that I catch. It's annoying because I'm trying to gain speed but my rear feet is slowing me down. I'm baffled because I don't know what I'm doing that is causing it.

I’m not sure what the problem is but if your feet are on the tail end of the board then you’re in the wrong place to generate speed

How do you "know" your feet are dragging thru the water ?

If they are dragging thru the water, how long is it "dragging" ? A second ? 10 seconds ?

It happens when you're "trying to gain speed", but what efforts are you taking to accomplish that ?

If you're having a problem, I always recommend to go back two steps to find the cause of the problem.

I know I'm dragging my rear feet because I can feel the water on my feet. It's pushing it so much that the board slows down and feels like it is locked that I can't move it.

I think this is happening when the waves are smaller. This occurred once today in my surf session.

I found a very old video from many years ago. I suspect I'm doing the exact same thing.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/miQE4oq5MGJvv4e57


Notice my rear feet keeps dipping into the wave.

From the video it doesn't look like your rear foot was dragging in the water, not until you completely lost speed and the board sunk and you felt behind it. Until them, the only water splashing I saw was coming from the rail of the board.

There was not much speed you could generate on that wave though, it was very small and kind of chubby. It seemed like your weight was towards the tail, so that probably slowed you down a little.

BaNZ wrote:I found a very old video from many years ago. I suspect I'm doing the exact same thing. ..... Notice my rear feet keeps dipping into the wave.

I don't understand what you are seeing in the video that leads me to believe you are dragging your feet.

Is what you're doing in the video, your technique for "gaining speed by going up and down" ?

IanCaio wrote:From the video it doesn't look like your rear foot was dragging in the water, not until you completely lost speed and the board sunk and you felt behind it.

I'm wondering if this is what's happening to me now. My weight is too far back on the tail thus causing it to sink where my rear foot is.

waikikikichan wrote:

Is what you're doing in the video, your technique for "gaining speed by going up and down" ?

I want to say no, but my guess is that I'm doing the same thing. As what I picture in my mind is almost far from real life. My wife no longer have time to record my surf.

I don't cross step or shuffle my feet when I try to gain speed. Usually both feet is locked in place so I kinda do the poo stance. It's very rare that I catch the wave in the right spot. Usually I'm too late and it's already all closed out. Or pretty much I catch it, go down really fast and then I've lost all momentum and the wave hits me from behind.

Video quality is bad, will need to open it up in youtube and set to hd.

This is what I meant by going up and down the wave. Now that I look at it, I'm barely going to the top of the wave. The guy behind me is able to generate much more speed. Whereas it looks like I'm only just getting pushed by it.

Also at the end where I try and go back to the pocket. I think my rear feet dragged in the water a little towards the end. Not entirely sure of if it's just the fin.

BaNZ wrote:I don't cross step or shuffle my feet when I try to gain speed. Usually both feet is locked in place so I kinda do the poo stance. It's very rare that I catch the wave in the right spot. Usually I'm too late and it's already all closed out. Or pretty much I catch it, go down really fast and then I've lost all momentum and the wave hits me from behind.

So your theory of your foot dragging isn't actually a reality. It might be because you are too late and behind the curl. It could be a sectioning wave that is breaking on you/ on your foot. It could be you are riding a board with too much float/too much rail or it could be too small of a board with not enough rail line to keep you planing.

Yes, from what I see you are a GLUE FOOT. But I don't see a Poo Stance, I see you doing a Hip jive/sway and a front foot tik tak. That's not a pump up and down, neither is it displacing water. It's just unneeded movements / expenditure of wasted energy that is not resulting in speed gains.

But let's consider that you are right and your foot is dragging and causing your board to slow down ( in small waves that you are already late to get into ), so then what ? What steps are you planning to take to remedy the situation ?

1) take an actual step forward ?
2) change the fin set up ?
3) change the board ? To get more float to keep your foot above the water.
4) push the tail more to displace more water from side to side ?
Or
5) Just Surf, stop worrying about your back foot and listen to the wave more.

I'm glad you're starting to realizing ( by going back two steps ) that the problem stems from your take off and positioning.

I would say the step to remedy the problem is 1. Take an actual step forward. If my back foot is dragging, then if I shift the weight towards the front, it should lift the tail out the water more.

As you have mentioned a lot of times, it's the indian and not the arrow. Few months ago I met someone with the same board as me. I told him the board is too slow and I want a faster one. He looked shocked, he said our board is fast and very easy to surf.

I have a problem with 5, listening to the wave more. When I paddle for a wave, I don't look behind me. It offsets my balance plus it makes me wonder if I'm gonna fall. Once I catch the wave, I'm never in the pocket or right section. I know because the shortboards will notice that I'm not in the right section and they will paddle for it.

Today's session was really bad because I was the only one in the point break. Although I was catching all the waves, I'm constantly in the white wash session and trying to get in the pocket. Or that I'm riding too far down the line and away from the curl so there is no speed.

I did still have a lot of fun. Though I think I should start taking some lessons to improve.

From the video, it looks like the guy behind you took off right at the peak, whereas you took off at the shoulder of a wave that broke too far left. That's probably why the guy had more speed -- he's at the pocket.

Surfing at an uncrowded point break + catching a bunch sounds like a good thing!

For me, to figure out the point break I surf is also not an easy task. It's actually quite complex - many peaks can break. I found lining up using landmarks on the shore line helps.

BaNZ wrote:I would say the step to remedy the problem is 1. Take an actual step forward. If my back foot is dragging, then if I shift the weight towards the front, it should lift the tail out the water more.

I don't think you really have a problem with the back foot dragging water, but specially with a bigger board weight shifting is definitely something you should be trying to do. Even on my shortboard where you aren't supposed to move as much as in a longboard sometimes I'll move forward when I need more speed. Tail is turns/control, forward is speed.

BaNZ wrote:I have a problem with 5, listening to the wave more. When I paddle for a wave, I don't look behind me. It offsets my balance plus it makes me wonder if I'm gonna fall.

That's another thing you should be aiming for: Looking at the wave while you are paddling allows you to adjust where you're going in relation to how the wave is forming, avoid dropping in someone, seeing how steep the drop will be. Slowly work that insecurity, because you gain a lot by being aware of all those things.

BaNZ wrote:I would say the step to remedy the problem is 1. Take an actual step forward. If my back foot is dragging, then if I shift the weight towards the front, it should lift the tail out the water more.

Okay............ so you bring the tail more out of the water....... THEN what ? Will the board pick up more speed ? Maybe if the wave section was flat and you bring the trim line more forward. But think about what creates DRIVE ( or what manufacturers always taut their product as having more of ). The Fin(s). And where are the fin(s) on the board ? On the back, which you've now purposely brought out of the water.

You know why the OTHER GUY surfs more fast than you, because he surfs further back on the tail of his board.
( Watch your video again and see how much nose is out of the water on his board compared to yours. )

BaNZ wrote:I would say the step to remedy the problem is 1. Take an actual step forward. If my back foot is dragging, then if I shift the weight towards the front, it should lift the tail out the water more.

I agree that this should be your first step. The sweet spot for trimming my longboard is to have my weight 2/3 forward. I step back for turns and return forward to trim.

The surfer on the wave behind you is going faster because they are on a bigger faster wave

waikikikichan wrote:You know why the OTHER GUY surfs more fast than you, because he surfs further back on the tail of his board.
( Watch your video again and see how much nose is out of the water on his board compared to yours. )

I was so sure that I'm slower because I'm too close to the middle of the board. Now that I looked carefully, I'm so wrong. I know he was on a bigger wave but he sure looks like his board was sticking out the water much more. I always thought that would slow you down.

I think I eventually figured out why my feet felt like it was dragging the water.

My last few session, I sat in the correct spot and took off very deep in the wave. I did not have feet dragging.

On one particular wave today, it was too crowded at the peak so I sat at the shoulder and wait for people to not catch it. When I catch the wave on the shoulder, I'm trying to drive the fins to create more speed, somehow this causes the tail to sink or drag along the wave. Just a guess.

BaNZ wrote:I'm trying to drive the fins to create more speed

I guess that is working against you actually, engaging the fins won't give you speed. They will aid on turns, but actually slow you down, because you'll be putting the weight back on the tail. If you're on the shoulder you should be worried about moving weight forward to gain momentum before turning.

Not a longboarder, but I think the only times where you'll need the fins on the take off are when you do a take off on the pocket and need to bottom turn quickly or on that advanced move that I don't know the name, where the longboarder will paddle on the opposite direction of the wave (in the direction of the pocket) and turn the board during the pop up, usually to go straight to a nose ride.

what size fins are you using specifically? If unsure look at them closely, they usually have a marking.