Cross Stepping

Tired of doing that awkward little crab scuffle as you inch around on your board? The cross step is a classic longboard move every Paddlesurfer should master. If nothing else it looks totally soulful. But really the reason for the cross step is not so you can win tango contests, it’s to keep the board flat and trimmed. Your crab scuttle rocks the board from side to side. A properly placed cross step distributes the weight across the board without dipping the rails.

Step one: Tango at home. Seriously–walk around for a few days cross stepping as often as you can. The movement needs to become natural before you get on a board. Don’t just stagger around sideways, place your foot carefully, keeping weight on your toes and heel as you put the foot down. The only way you can do that is to bend your knees, stick your ass out, and get low.. Which is exactly what you want to do. Don’t bend forward at the waist–stay balanced.

Step two: Get loose on your board. Move around, shift your weight, step forward and back. I see guys all the time that are rooted in place on the board.

Step three: Fall in a lot. Hey, it’s going to happen. Catch a wave, trim in, get in a good surfing stance, stay low, start steppin’ brah.

Step four: Be one with the waves. As you move forward the board will accelerate down the wave–unless you’re trimmed straight down the line. As the board accelerates it will tend to boot you off the back. One more reason to stay low.

Step five: No premature celebration. I tend to take three steps and then stand up straight to say “look at me, I’m cross-stepping” though the last three words are mumbled underwater. Stay low going forward, then step your way back.

Okay, NOW you can celebrate.

Being Held Down

Even the idea of being held on the bottom or stuffed under a ledge of reef can start your heart pounding–and that’s exactly what you don’t want to do. If you’re relaxed and calm you can easily hold your breath for 30 seconds, with practice 60 seconds is easy. If you’re panicked and thrashing around it’s more like ten.

Even a fairly small wave can catch you in exactly the wrong spot and pin you. A big wave has all kinds of unpredictable things happening under it. You might pop out in just a few seconds after a wipeout on a big wave, or you could be down on the bottom looking through a curtain of foam, trying to figure out which way is up.

When everything is going bad, time gets haywire. A big wave period (the time between waves) is 15 to 20 seconds. If you are held down until just before the next wave comes, that’s probably twenty seconds maximum.

A two wave hold down, which is pretty rare and considered to be pretty horrific, is at the very most, 40 seconds, and more likely 30 seconds. It might seem like you’re down there for ten minutes, but even a really bad hold down is in the easy range of holding your breath–if you are calm and relaxed.

Of course calmly holding your breath in our living room and doing it while you’re being bounced across a reef are two different things. But the living room is a decent place to practice. You might also want to try the classic hold down exercise–carrying weights underwater. Good training if the prospect scares you. It doesn’t have to be a fifty pound boulder, twenty pounds of dive weights will give you valuable experience.

Here’s some things to consider when the wave is dropping on your head:

1. Why don’t I have some floatation? You might think it looks dorky, but don’t tell that to Laird–he’s usually wearing an impact vest with floatation when he’s charging big stuff. So do an increasing number of tow-in surfers. Even light ones aren’t as comfortable as no vest is, and they can be a liability in a crowded surf spot–it’s tough to dive under a board that’s headed toward your head if you’ve got a vest on. But when a double overhead lip falls on you and you pop up in the foam four seconds later, that vest feels REALLY comfortable.

2. Your paddle can help. If you held onto your paddle when you fell, it adds a little buoyancy and will help pull you up. When you get hit by a wave, putting the paddle behind your head tends to push you upwards. I don’t know why that works, but in my experience it does help. Once you get out of the impact zone you can toss your paddle towards your board and swim unencumbered, or tuck it in your rash guard for a little added float.

3. Don’t fight the power. When you’re being held down, relax as much as possible during the turbulent stage. You can’t swim against the wave’s currents and you’ll just burn up O2. Wait for the bubbles to start to rise, and follow them up. Watch for your board as you surface, no point in adding a head injury to your challenges.

4. Duck and cover. The most important element is simply being calm and getting breaths when you can. Try to control your body by keeping your arms in and your knees bent and clenched while you’re in the wash. And take your time. Kicking like crazy for a breath works some of the time, but one day a lip will fall above you just before you reach the surface.

5. Take the ride. If the waves are breaking outside your position and you can reach your board, get a good grip on it before the next set hits. If the sets aren’t huge and you are getting hit by mostly whitewater, sitting on the board near the tail, holding on with your hands, and dangling your feet will keep you above the whitewater. If nothing else you’ll get pushed out of the impact zone in the whitewater. Just make sure there’s no one barreling down on you as you sit there like a bobber.

6. Bail if necessary. If the lip is headed straight for your head, or other surfers are headed towards you, conditions might be better a few feet down. Get as big a breath as you can, and duck under, diving towards and under the wave. Arch your back and kick forward and chances are you’ll pop out the back quickly. Just make sure you’re deep enough that you don’t get sucked backward over the falls. That’s always bad.

Retrieve your board, and get the heck out of there. You probably only need fifty feet to be in safer water.

One of the beautiful things about surfing is that you’re on your own. In the toughest times no one can really help you. Maybe not as much as when you jump out the door of an airplane, but how things turn out in the surf is pretty much up to you. A little conditioning, a little practice, and some mental discipline will go a long way to making sure they turn out well.

The UK standup Scene

Matt Argyle, styling in a frosty UK wave

2007 has been something of a seminal year for stand up paddle boarding in the UK. We had our first national SUP competition held in perfect 3-4ft waves in Cornwall, the British Stand Up Paddle Boarding Association was formed (BSUPA) and we began to see more people out in the surf on SUP boards.

The scene at the moment is small, most stand up paddle surfers know each other and, apart from at the competition, you usually don’t see more than one or two in the line-up. Despite this it’s the most exciting surfing sport scene we have seen in the UK since those first long boards arrived in the 1960’s in Cornwall.

The UK is blessed with over 11,000 miles of coast line and the stand up paddle surfers are just starting to explore it. Just as an example, I was out at my local point break, West Wittering, in a nice 2-3ft swell, once again I was the only SUP surfer out in a pack of longboarders when I saw another SUP surfer heading out into the channel between the point break and Hayling Island, and he started surfing the outer banks. These waves can be pretty much unsurfable due to the currents and rip tides and the way the wave reforms, but on a SUP board you can power over the reform and keep surfing. I guess we are all learning to shake off our preconceptions on what a surf break should be and we are looking to the possibilities out there.

Olaus Mcleod and his challenge board

We have our very own Laird Hamilton in the shape of Olaus Mcleod. Olaus is based in Cornwall and his day job is an airline pilot, he started SUP surfing in December 2006. He has been one of the keenest advocates of SUP in the UK and decided to promote the sport with a herculean challenge. On the 21st April 2007 he paddled from Lands End to the Isles of Scilly (approximately 35 miles), the next day he ran the 2007 Tresco Marathon, then he planned to return the following day, but got about 2 hours into the Atlantic and gale force winds arrived forcing him to abandon the challenge. This year’s challenge is to paddle from the West Coast, through the river system, and onto London on the East Coast.

Adam Zervas in a complicated-looking wave

Another example of someone who is pushing the boundaries in the UK is Simon Jayham. Based in Swansea, South Wales, Simon runs his own surf school and has been chasing big waves for years. Last year he was introduced to SUP during a lull the swell in Madeira. He is now searching for and surfing big waves in the UK on his SUP board. Once again these sort of waves are unsurfable with traditional surfbaords, due to rip and tide currents.

The British Stand Up Paddle Association (BSUPA) has been formed and there are four surf competitions planned all over the country, with the aim to crown a UK champion male and female SUP rider at the end of the year.

The future for SUP looks bright, although alot of people who are hesitating to make the SUP plunge are asking themselves whether this sport is just a fad or whether it is here to stay. I think that it is here to stay simply because it offers so much to the individual. You can get heaps more water time, it keeps you seriously fit and you can explore.

Article by Matt Argyle

Fins and Board Shapes

Fins work best when they are in the water

This article is going to evolve over time as I learn more. I’m working on a general chart that will enable you to pick a condition–like “the board won’t maintain direction in the waves” then you choose your current fin setup and it suggests corrective action. Right now it’s a collection of post-it notes. I need to do a bunch of experiments, or find someone who already has, so I can give real information.
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2008 Maui Stand Up Board and Paddle Showcase

The muffled thump and curses in a Boston accent told me brother Bob had tried to move another palm tree with his face.

It’s nerve-wracking carrying boards, paddles, tents, coolers, tables and myriad other items across a pitch-dark park to the beach. Especially when you’re wearing the traditional Maui “slippahs”. Cheap between-the-toe thong sandals afford little toe protection from the myriad stumps, bumps and lava rocks. [Read more]

How Not to Be a Surf Monk

We know you’re a soulful surfer, but did you really intend to be celibate? Are dates a wistful memory? The last time a girl gave you her number, did it start with 555? Have you decided that women are just too finicky, too flaky, too unobtainable?

You may be a surf monk.

[Read more]

Showcase Success

Fifty two boards, thirty five riders (growing to fifty by day’s end) knee to waist high waves, sunshine, and lots of aloha. It was as close to being a perfect day as anyone could ask for. All our testers did a superb job, with most evaluating twenty boards apiece (we assigned ten). Zane Schweitzer, Slater Trout (pictured going tandem here), and Conner Baxter our youngest testers, hit the water running and never slowed all day. You could power a small city on their energy. [Read more]

Big Guy On Little Boards: JL 10′6″ and 10′8″ Pintail

I guess 10′6″ isn’t little to some folks, but when you weigh 245 and your skills are modest, it’s dinky. Here’s video… [Read more]